ADMARC Restructuring: Close to 4000 jobs cut
As the country’s economic challenges continue, government has fired close to 4 000 employees of the country’s produce marketer, ADMARC Limited.
In a staff circular seen by Capital FM, the authorities have confirmed completion of the mandatory paid leave and 100% retrenchment of the parastatal’s employees.
“…the last working day for all employees is 31st January. All employees will receive their letters of retrenchment within seven days from the date of this secular,” reads part of the document
ADMARC staff were sent on mandatory paid leave last September after hitherto agriculture minister, Lobin Lowe, announced a shutdown of operations at the institution.
While reports suggest that ADMARC only needs about 1,500 workers, the State produce marketer’s staff totals 4,063 – translating into a monthly wage bill of 750 million kwacha.
The retrenchments mean government will have to cough billions of kwacha in settlings the packages for the employees.
Meanwhile, the authorities have since announced that they will retain on a three-month-contract basis, a few employees.
“The company will give a three months employment contracts to some employees, especially those that worked as skeleton from 1st February 2023, to help with the transition while the company will be completing other process,” the secular further states.
The lean transitional staff is expected to be handed their contracts within the next seven days.
However, there are now fears that the shutdown of ADMARC will negatively impact prices of agricultural produce.
Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources scholar, Horace Phiri, predicts that private traders will likely take advantage of ADMARC’s closure to exploit common Malawians.
“We should expect that consumers will now be at the mercy of private actors and may see prices that are quite high in the coming months, as private actors operate on profits and not necessarily to supply goods as ADMARC would,” Phiri said.
He has however called on the authorities to sour tot the mess surrounding ADMARC as reduced operations of the corporation will have a hard hitting impact.
Meanwhile, the retrenched staff have since been assured of their salary for January, pension arrears, as well as retrenchment packages.