The Agriculture, Water and Land Reform Ministry has denied claims that there is no production taking place at the Etunda Green Scheme Irrigation Project in the Omusati Region.
The farm manager, Sacky Shilyomunhu, says there has been no work halted at the project and its business as usual.
Shilyomunhu says when the green scheme projects were returned to the Agriculture ministry last year, the ministry commenced with various interventions, including mobilising funds to ensure continued production at various green schemes in the country, including at Etunda.
"There was a video trending on social media regarding a pivot that was not under production; there was nothing produced because one reason is that these guys are producing pivot by pivot and is one out of seven that is not under production and they are busy track with it, and one of the biggest issues is vandalism from the community members. This is what is pushing us back to put this infrastructure into production, but everything is under control, and there is nothing to worry about come early next year; all these pivots are on production."
Currently, they are busy planting maize for the small-scale farmers section, and they have already covered over a hundred hectares. They anticipate planting a total of 250 hectares of maize for them in December.
There is also ongoing harvesting of asparagus, with farmers getting dry asparagus for free as animal feed as part of drought mitigation measures.
Asparagus, cabbages, sweet potatoes, peppers, tomatoes, onions, and butternuts are some of the crops under irrigation.
They are also adding value to the maize harvested last season by milling and selling it to local retailers.
A small-scale farmer, Elizabeth Nakale, has been at Etunda for three years and now has different varieties of crops under irrigation and looks forward to a promising harvest output.
"I am currently having 0.3 hectors of tomatoes that I am expecting to harvest at the end of November, and I still have another one that will follow since I am practicing first cropping. I still have 7 thousand populations in my nursery that I am going to harvest at the end of December."