. Lubinda

By SAM PHIRI –
A MONTH after the Government banned the importation of edible oils, foreign brands have continued to flow into the country taking space on the Zambian retail shelves.
A check by the Sunday Times revealed that many named South African chain stores and other local retail outlets still had huge stocks of imported brands, especially from South Africa.
On March 14, 2015, the Government suspended the issuance of licences for importation of edible oils, but this move has created a tussle between the Government’s directive and retailers who have continued stocking the brand.
A local manufacturer of Zamgold cooking oil, Imran Merchant, said the ban was a positive move for the local manufacturers but that they had not yet started reaping the benefits as the market was still flooded with foreign brands.
Mr Merchant said despite the ban, cooking oil had continued to be smuggled into the country, thereby creating less impact on the local supply circuit.
“Some of these trucks laden with cooking oil are marked as though they are using Zambia as a transit point en route to another country when in the actual sense, the oil is offloaded in Zambia,” Mr Merchant said.
He said that the Zambia Revenue Authority (ZRA) was losing a lot of money through the crooked manner in which cooking oil was brought into the country.
But one of South Africa’s chain stores, Pick-n-Pay Zambia that has stocks of imported cooking oil, said it was still clearing its old stocks ordered before the ban was effected.
Operations manager Riccardo Franco said Pick-n-Pay Zambia had never imported any edible oils ever since the ban was effected.
Mr Franco, however, said it would take a while before imported stocks were cleared because local brands were also doing very well and that most shops still had imported cooking oil.
The seemingly high demand for the consumers’ ‘trusted’ foreign brands is also reportedly increasing production of counterfeit cooking oil packaged within the country but with foreign tagging.
Minister of Agriculture and Livestock Given Lubinda said the Government had taken that move in the wake of complaints from Zambian producers and manufacturers that the country had been flooded with imported oil, thereby disadvantaging local brands.
Mr Lubinda said the decision was made to allow experts from the ministries of Finance, Commerce and ZRA to study the impact of vegetable oil importation on the Zambian market.
But Agriculture Deputy Minister Maxas Ng’onga said there was no ban on the importation of edible oils but that Mr Lubinda made the decision to allow experts from the ministries of Finance, Commerce and the ZRA to study the impact of vegetable oil importation on the Zambian market.