Carmen Martinez (United States ambassador to Zambia) said that Zambia is now open for business since the provision of a conducive atmosphere for private sector growth by the government.

Meanwhile the Zambia State Insurance Corporation (ZSIC) has provided US$1 million to Freshpikt, a fruit and vegetable canning factory that has opened in Lusaka to process canned beans, pineapples, tomatoes, guava, tomato paste and glucose, among other products.

Ms Martinez said in Lusaka yesterday during the launch of Freshpikt, that the many activities in the private sector would help to develop the Zambian economy especially with value addition to primary agricultural production.

She also said that the coming of the Freshpikt factory, which was supported by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), was an example of growth of the private sector that adds value to the agricultural sector.

“Growth in the number and size of private enterprise is the single most important factor in eradicating the crippling poverty that afflicts so many of Zambia’s people,” she said.

Ms Martinez mentioned that her government supported Freshpikt because of the many multiplier effects that it would have on the Zambian economy, especially that many farmers would now have access to a ready market for their produce, while earning the country foreign currency through exports of the final products.

Scott Simons,the USAID chief of party, said that the project, supported through the Production, Finance and Technology project (Profit) and the Market Access, Trade and Enabling Policies Project (MATEP), would transform the industry and expand the agricultural sector.

Freshpikt chairman, Chance Kabaghe, said the company started operating this year and would be producing on a daily basis 80 tonnes of tomatoes, 20 tonnes of sweetcorn, 60 tonnes of mangoes, and yearly capacity of 800 tonnes of beans and 20,000 tonnes of cassava.

Mr Kabaghe said he and four other investors from Zimbabwe bought the former Zambia Horticultural Product Company through the Zambia Privatisation Agency (ZPA) last year and invested $200,000 funding from the USAID.

He said ZSIC had just approved $1 million, but that the company still required further funding and that it would require a total investment of $3 million to rehabilitate the plant fully.

Agriculture and Cooperatives Minister, Mundia Sikatana, said he was excited that after years of idling, Freshpikt brought back to life the plant and expressed hope that farmers would be able to supply it with the required quantities of raw materials.

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