Zambia Agribusiness Society

Plant propagation is the art, science, and business of multiplying plants. Plant propagation is the method to increase the number of outstanding fruit and crop varieties in order to perpetuate their desirable qualities such as high production, large fruits, and excellent eating quality—those that command better market prices. Ways to propagate plants: Sexual : through the use of seeds (for papaya, mangosteen, and for root stocks for asexual propagation). Asexual : through the use of plant parts other than seeds. This does not involve the exchange of genetic material, so the process almost always produces plants that are identical to the parent. Advantage of asexual propagation: Plants are true-to-type. More rapid means of producing planting materials for crops such as cassava, sweet potato, and other root crops. Plants start fruiting in a shorter time than normal, and mature into sm...

Divide your greenhouse into sections and ensure you spend a predetermined amount of time in each area, starting with plants in entry ways where pests often come in. Look over the entire crop to evaluate uniformity, overall colour and height. Check for plants that look different from others, and if any troubled areas stand out, start looking for pests. Inspect both the upper and lower leaf surfaces as well as the undersides. Monitor for pest populations by using biological traps such as Whitefly and Tuta traps. These should be placed at regular intervals in the greenhouse Frequent scouting affords farmers the opportunity to detect and manage problems before damage occurs. It is recommended that scouting is done at least once a week and more often when conditions are conducive for problem pests. To determine the success of a chemical application, scout after 3 to 4 days after application.

Making a revenue of over 100, 000 Kwacha in 2020, amidst the COVID-19 pandemic is our very own 25 year old Zambian young woman, Precious Muka Botha who is making her living off of snails. Miss Botha is a mother of two who is currently studying to be a clinical officer. Aside from medicine, she also dedicates her time to her snail farming business (heliciculture). So why would one decide to go into heliciculture? When asked about why she went into the field, Miss Botha said she decided to take an interest in snail farming because while growing up she had the darkest skin in the family. Overwhelmed by her insecurities, she decided to start bleaching her skin in an attempt to fit in. This, unfortunately, caused her skin to react. It was because of this skin condition that she decided to research on ways to better her skin and return it to its natural state. It was while researching that she came across the remedy of using snail slime. The snail slim significantly improved her skin...

Carrot farming is one of the highly as well as lucrative farming activities that you can tap into and earn a living. Here are the key basics that you can adopt and earn good money since it only requires a small portion of land, shorter maturity duration and minimum attention. 1. Facts about Carrots Most varieties of carrots are resistant to pests and diseases, and they are also a good late-season crop that can tolerate frost. In fact, they prefer to be grown during the cooler ends of the growing season - spring and fall. Carrots’ root is rich in sugar, and a great source of vitamins and carotene. Not all carrots are orange; varieties vary in colour from purple to white! If there is a challenge to growing carrots, it’s just having soil that’s not too heavy - otherwise, you’ll end up with stunted, round carrots! Most carrot varieties need deep, loose soil that lets them grow without difficulty. Carrots are grown from seed and take between 2 and 4 months to mature, depending on ...

As the debate of whether investing in life insurance is a good idea or not continues till date, you can surely come to the conclusion that there are more reasons why you should do it instead of not investing if only you look around a bit. Investing in life insurance can result in being one of the best and most important financial decisions that you can make. We will list out the top ten reasons why you should invest and then you judge for yourself whether investing in it will be a good option or not. Life insurance comes down to the fact that it is a step taken to protect, care and safeguard for the future. Life insurance as mentioned earlier is a highly debatable topic but most of the points against it are based purely on misconceptions. In the following list, we will enlist every important and convincing reason as to why life insurance is an essential step and clear out any misconception in the process. Why You Need to Invest in Life Insurance The top ten reasons are: 1...

The trend of anti-microbial free feeding programs and the adoption of other such approaches is increasing among poultry, cattle, and other livestock animals. And in this subject, direct fed microbial or DFM is one of the most popularly growing methods to boost the health of livestock.  Also referred to as probiotics, DFM is a product consist of live and feasible microorganisms such as bacteria or yeast that are most commonly provided to the livestock. This in turn aids in altering the gastrointestinal flora and overall health of the animal. In the past few years, the awareness regarding DFM has immensely increased among pet and cattle owners. Owing to this, their adoption of direct fed microbial has significantly increased for livestock. In a report published by Allied Market Research, the global direct fed microbial market is anticipated to hit $1.77 billion by 2026.  How does it help to boost the Health of Livestock? Over the last decade or more, DFM has shown beneficial r...

What is the problem? Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a major global threat of increasing concern. It can occur naturally as all microbes can adapt to their surrounding environment. However, it is exacerbated by inappropriate and excessive use of antimicrobials in both human healthcare and the agriculture sector. Antimicrobials are used in terrestrial animal production practices to preserve animal and public health (e.g. to prevent and control zoonoses), but also as growth promoters at a sub-therapeutic level. The estimates of the total annual global consumption of antimicrobials in animal production vary considerably. This is due to poor surveillance and data collection in many countries, for example, only 42 countries in the world have a system to collect data on the use of antimicrobials in livestock...The estimated worldwide antimicrobial consumption in the livestock sector in 2010 was 63 151 tonnes. It cannot be ignored that two-thirds of the estimated future growth o...