Zambia’s Food Reserve Agency (FRA) announced Wednesday that white maize flour has gone up. However despite farmers being happy with the price consumers will now have to dig deeper in their pockets.

Maize is one of the major foods for several African countries.

An FRA Spokesperson Mwamwa Siame said the new price was now at 45,000 Zambian Kwacha (US$ 14) adding that so far farmers were happy with the price and that there were not complaints.

She further said the maize exports were still banned in the country.

“Maize exports are still banned until further notice," Siame said.

Zambia banned maize exports two months ago just a month after Malawi had also announced its maize ban.

The ban came due to a slump in production, though the FRA said early this year it had in excess of 400,000 tonnes in carryover maize stocks.

A Reuters report Wednesday said FRA, which manages the National Food Security Reserve, purchases grain at the start of the season for release at market value if the private sector is unable to meet demand.

The report further said industry officials have placed the country's total national requirement -- including for the brewery and stock feed industries -- at around 1.2 million tonnes.

The Southern African country’s maize output fell to 1.2 million tones this year from 1.3 million last year due to floods in some parts of the country.

Anthony Mwanaumo, an FRA executive director told a news conference that his body would keep enough maize in strategic reserves to minimise the effects of rising global food prices.

The FRA director revealed that China would help Zambia to construct grain storage facilities in the coming months with a capacity of 100,000 tonnes in various locations.

Meanwhile the country’s President Levy Mwanawasa has been admitted to intensive care in a Paris hospital but is in a stable condition, his vice-president said on Wednesday.

Mwanawasa is currently the Southern African Development Community (SADC) chairman, which has been mediating between Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe and the opposition seeking to end a political and economic crisis in the country.

The Zambian president aged 59, who is said to be the favourite for International Monetary Fund(IMF) for his fight against corruption in his country after taking over power from Fredrick Chiluba, was rushed to a hospital on Sunday in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh after suffering a stroke just before an African Union summit and was flown to France on Tuesday.

The country’s Vice president Rupiah Banda told Reuters in a statement that Mwanawasa was in a stable condition and that he was receiving treatment for hypertension in the intensive care unit.