2 December 2008
THE Joint Presidency Committee of representatives of the farmers' organisations NNFU, NAU and Emerging Farmers Forum held its last meeting for the year in Windhoek last week under the chairmanship of Pinthile Davids, president of the Namibia National Farmers' Union (NNFU).
The JPC discussed the emerging farmers' support programme, the Hoodia-growing project and the bush-to-energy project, which are under the banner of the JPC.
The future of these projects will be discussed by a smaller committee of the JPC early next year.
After the NAU's stated its views on a possible merger of farmers' unions, the other members of the JPC will give their points of view at a next opportunity, after which the future of organised agriculture will be discussed in depth.
The NAU's point of view is that the commercial and communal production systems in Namibia justify two agricultural unions that can pay attention to the specific needs of each system.
The aim of the talks between the NAU and the management of the emerging farming sector is to see whether the current structures of the NAU can be united with the emerging farming sector so that there would only be one mouthpiece for the commercial sector.
Various options were considered and the Emerging Farmers Forum announced that they will discuss these options and in due course hold a meeting with the NAU again.
It was further agreed that the chairmanship and secretarial services of the JPC and Livestock Producers Forum (LPF) will in future be handled on a rotating basis.
The NNFU will be responsible for the JPC in 2009 while the NAU will handle the functions of the LPF.
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