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Nqobile Tshili, Chronicle Reporter
Government is working to revitalise the command livestock programme to enable farmers to restock after thousands of their cattle succumbed to drought during the 2018/2019 farming season, an official said.
Government launched the command livestock programme in 2018 targeting farmers mostly in southern parts of the country.
In launching the programme, President Mnangagwa said Government had noted that due to the varied ecological regions in the country, the Matabeleland region did not perform well in the initial Command Agriculture programme which focused on crop production.
The President handed over 1 660 heifers to 151 beneficiaries from Matabeleland South’s seven districts revealing that the Government had channeled US$10 million towards the programme which was going to be shared by Matabeleland North and South.
Poor rains in the 2018/2019 rainy season saw most water bodies in communal areas running dry and pastures being affected also.
This resulted in most farmers losing huge numbers of livestock with more than 15 596 cattle succumbing to drought in Matabeleland South. Lands, Agriculture, Water, Culture and Rural Resettlement Deputy Minister Douglas Karoro said Government was putting up measures to ensure that farmers who lost livestock could restock.
He was speaking in Senate on Thursday after Matabeleland South Senator Cde Tambudzani Mohadi asked what the Government was doing to cushion farmers who lost livestock due to drought.
“We need to acknowledge as a country that we had a drought that led to the loss of quite a number of our livestock. We also need to take cognisance of the fact that Government had a programme, the Command Livestock Programme and it is that programme that we hope to revitalise after this drought. We want to revitalise the programme so as to enable our farmers to restock. So, the Command Livestock Programme will be revitalised to make sure that we assist our farmers to restock,” said Deputy Minister Karoro.
While the rains might have come late, they have renewed hope for livestock farmers as water bodies and grazing pastures have improved in most parts of the country.
“Yes, the rainfall pattern changed and we received rains rather late. This is going to affect our yield. When we eventually got rainfall there are areas that we anticipated would not get anything but because of Command Agriculture, we see things are shaping up. We may have a semi-drought but our yield for this season is rather low but we are on the safe side and this is because of the late rains,” he said. — @nqotshili
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