Hunger stalks Manicaland

Senior Reporter
ACUTE hunger is distressing Manicaland with at least 14 percent of the province’s rural population enduring its severity following a drought-inflicted 2014/15 agricultural season. The Provincial Administrator, Mr Fungai Mbetsa, last week admitted that the situation had worsened in “drier rural parts” of the province. According the 2015 Zimbabwe Vulnerability Assessment Committee (ZimVAC) report, Manicaland has 14 percent of food insecure people.
About 14 percent of the province’s rural households were rated as food secure.
Buhera District was the worst affected at 39 percent.

Manicaland experienced a severe crop failure due to early termination of the rains in February which led to a severe shortfall in production to meet its annual food requirements.

“The situation is really bad especially in Buhera, which is the driest district in the province,” said Mr Mbetsa.
He said other problem areas include rural parts of Mutare District, Chimanimani, Nyanga North, Chipinge, parts of Mutasa and Makoni districts where there is evidence of high and persistent malnutrition levels among rural school children and further delays in bringing food relief at the doorsteps of the suffering communities may lead to mass starvation.

“The situation was compounded by the fact that communal farmers in Buhera and Chipinge did not plant anything due to the poor rains. And you can imagine what is happening to those households,” said Mr Mbetsa.

He added that the World Food Programme had identified Buhera for assistance. The ZimVac report also noted that production of the major crops in 2014/15 decreased in the province compared to their production in the 2013/14 season mainly due to a poor rainfall season in most parts of the country. Most areas in Manicaland were this season characterised by limited and unreliable rainfall that was concentrated during a short rainy season with the remaining period tending to be relatively or absolutely dry.

Rains were late and irregular in large parts and at some point excessive to the extent of submerging the crop, thereby affecting production because of the sporadic dry spell at various periods during this current rain season.

At most, these areas receive annual rainfall of 500m and high temperatures during the rainy season cause much of this rainfall to be lost through evaporation. Besides being water deficient, dry lands of Manicaland which include the entirety of Buhera, Mutare, Chimanimani districts, the larger parts of Chipinge, Nyanga, Mutasa and Makoni districts — are synonymous with exceptionally high summer day temperatures, low humidity, high run off and soil erosion.