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Agriculture Reporter
THE Government has acknowledged the positive contribution of extension services, saying they were at the centre of the agricultural transformation thrust that had borne high levels of technicality in farmers as evidenced by increased productivity levels.
In a statement the Ministry of Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development permanent secretary Dr John Basera said the various initiatives being implemented by Government had helped improve extension service delivery to farmers.
“Technical advice has seen sound implementation of Government programmes, facilitating scaled-up wheat production, Pfumvudza/Intwasa adoption and a record crop in the tobacco sub-space,” said Dr Basera.
Extension advisory is important as the country aims to ensure food security and self-sufficiency through maximum production and productivity.
The Government has been implementing various initiatives capacitating extension workers to support farmers for increased production.
“One of the important issues we had to deal with in growing the sector was to ease mobility of extension staff by providing each and every one of them with a motor bike resulting in them accessing far areas to reach production zones,” said Dr Basera.
The Government also rolled out refresher courses for extension service workers to bridge the knowledge gap between them and modern agricultural practices.
The courses focused on aspects of technical production, marketing and agri-prenuership covering crops, livestock and fisheries.
“This has seen farmers being capacitated in the thematic areas of good agricultural practices, farming as a business, post-harvest management and natural resources administration,” said Dr Basera.
The Government established farmer field schools in all the 35 000 villages across the country to ease extension service delivery, as the country aims to bridge the information gap affecting the agriculture sector.
“The village farmer field schools provided a centralised point where farmers interacted with extension services workers during the 2022/23 summer season resulting in a maize bumper harvest of 2, 3 million tonnes, a 58 percent increase from the 1, 5 million recorded the previous season,” said Dr Basera.
“We are on a journey to grow the agriculture sector and one of the key dictates is to change and improve the way we do farming in the country and extension service workers are crucial in supporting and feeding farmers with the relevant expertise.”
In the wake of climate change, the agriculture sector has become more dynamic with farmers needing to change some production practices to ensure production viability.
“We believe that extension services personnel will transform the agriculture sector, therefore we continue to capacitate them to make the division more robust and responsive to the needs of farmers,” said Dr Basera.
Online Reporter