With Africa struggling to meet its annual food needs, using technology and genetically modified seeds should be explored to boost production.

Zambia's maize production in the 2023/24 season is down by more than 50% to an estimated harvest of 1.6 million tonnes because of the intense heatwave and mid-summer drought. The country must now import about a million tonnes of maize to meet its domestic annual needs.

The government has encouraged the private sector in the country to ramp up its effort to import maize. However, the challenge is that it wants only non-genetically modified maize. Zambia still prohibits cultivating and importing genetically modified maize (GMO maize).

It is already difficult to find white maize in the world market regardless of whether it is GMO or GMO-free, as the major producers are the southern African region (South Africa specifically) and Mexico. Most of the world's maize is yellow maize for animal feed.

The drought has hit the entire southern Africa region. The region's primary maize producer, South Africa, saw its harvest fall by 19% year-on-year to 13.3 million tonnes in the 2023/24 season. Still, South Africa could have about 1.5 million tonnes for the export markets. This is both white and yellow maize.

South Africa is out of the equation when considering GMO-free maize, as the country's...