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Elton Manguwo
AS the country’s push to boost agricultural productivity hots up, the Government has announced plans to roll out a virtual agriculture college programme to equip farmers with the latest agricultural industrial trends to boost production in the sector.
Speaking during a field day in Mazowe on Friday, Ministry of Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development permanent secretary Dr John Basera revealed that plans were afoot for the introduction of the online school to bridge the knowledge gap between farmers and modern farming practices.
“The initiative will target to capacitate and support beneficiaries of the land reform programme and farm workers among others, so they can effectively produce on their allocated land,” said Dr Basera.
The Ministry of Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development has made significant strides in modernising the sector and the online colleges will complement the effort of continuous improvement in farming for maximum production.
Dr Basera highlighted that the virtual agriculture college would be critical in equipping farmers who are not in the trade by qualification with the right skills so that they can take farming as business.
“The major resource required for the achievement of the objective of becoming a smart agriculture economy by 2025 is information and communication technology (ICT) in agriculture to provide farmers with vital information and data,” said Dr Basera.
ICT solutions are critical for a sustainable agricultural sector, as they attend to the targets of sustainable development goals (SDGs) framework and mitigating effects of climate changes for food security amid increasing populations and corresponding pressures on the available agricultural land.
“We believe the online platform will be one of the components that will complete the land reform process,” said Dr Basera.
The agricultural sector remains the backbone of the economy, as it provides raw materials for the processing industry. It is therefore imperative that the sector remains competitive, innovative and adorned with modern agricultural communication technology.
Consequently, the Ministry has been capacitating extension workers with modern tablets and motorbikes to enhance service delivery to farmers.
“The advent of climate change has resulted in the roping in of agricultural methods that influence precision production and conservation agriculture practices. The capacitation of extension workers with modern tablets gives the country the advantage of keeping abreast with the latest agricultural developments,” said Dr Basera.
In addition, the access to real time data is the only way to empower farmers and achieve national economic transformation through agriculture.
“The investment in ICT in agriculture is part of Ministry’s strategy in the digitalisation of agriculture leading to automated decision making to improve on efficiency, increase production and productivity,” said Dr Basera.
Recently the Minister of Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development Dr Anxious Masuka said the Ministry’s strategy was development that left no one, no household and no village behind adding that the plan was anchored on the agriculture and food systems transformation strategy and national development strategy 1 (NDS1).
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