Online Reporter
Business Reporter
The Midlands Sweet Potato Cluster says it is looking at broadening its sweet potato production and exports into high-demand markets like South Africa, Namibia and Middle East countries.
ZimTrade has been instrumental in supporting the Midlands Sweet Potatoes Cluster’s initiative, providing crucial assistance to enhance production quality, meet export standards and secure necessary certifications. The ultimate goal is to access global markets, with the first exports targeted for December 2025.
To date, 42 farmers have been trained and registered as a cooperative under the Midlands Farmers Commodities Cooperative. The cluster is receiving training to comply with Global Gap requirements, a critical step in ensuring the sweet potatoes meet international standards.
In addition to capacity building, ZimTrade is exploring markets across the region, with promising enquiries from neighbouring countries such as South Africa and Namibia.
The Midlands Sweet Potatoes Cluster’s efforts, supported by ZimTrade, aim to establish Zimbabwe as a new player in the global sweet potato export market.
Since its establishment in 2024, the cluster has benefited significantly from ZimTrade’s interventions, including the cultivation of vines for propagation and distribution among growers.
The farmers attribute a substantial increase in production to ZimTrade’s impact, particularly through the Global Gap training.
ZimTrade’s approach is built on four key pillars: market intelligence, market development, market promotion and advocacy. This comprehensive support aligns with the Government’s vision under the Second Republic’s mantra of “Leaving No One and No Place Behind”, ensuring inclusive economic growth and development.
Through its efforts, ZimTrade is not only enhancing the cluster’s export potential but also contributing to the broader national development agenda.
In an interview, one of the Midlands Sweet Potato Cluster’s members, Mr Nicholas Chimbwedza, said collaboration with ZimTrade comes in handy and will go a long way in growing their export capacity into the region.
“As a cluster, we have targeted to have our first exports into South Africa this year and that within the next five years, we should be able to supply a constant supply of 100 tonnes every month, continuously to the markets.
“We are going to divide ourselves into those that are doing irrigation, and those that depend on rain-fed crops; they will also produce to cover the gap in between.
“With the varieties that we are producing, we are looking at something like between 15 and 32 tonnes per hectare by the end of the year, depending on the variety of seed which we have produced,” said Mr Chimbwedza.
Some of the varieties being grown by the farmers include Georgia Jet, Covington, Okinawa, and Mozambique White. The farmers are using disease-clean vines, thanks to ZimTrade assistance which has facilitated their production in collaboration with Kutsaga seeds.
Midlands Sweet Potatoes Cluster chairman Mr Alex Marufu indicated that he was grateful to ZimTrade for the training, seeds, and support, including trial exports to South Africa, which has empowered the cluster to confidently expand production.
“We appreciate ZimTrade for training to capacitate us towards the global gap requirements, they have even provided us with seeds, and they have even come up with trial exports with South Africa. Our farmers now feel empowered and we are confident to grow our hectarage and capacity to export going forward,” said Mr Marufu.
ZimTrade Client Advisor Ms Nozipho Maphala said the clusters programme, launched in 2022, aims to promote export-driven activities across Zimbabwe’s 10 provinces, identifying and leveraging each province’s most economically viable opportunities.
“As ZimTrade we have identified farmers so that they can begin producing for exports. We grouped these farmers together, embarked on a training exercise to let them understand what the production requirements were, and also we gave them market intelligence about which markets were interested in sweet potatoes.
“As we developed these, it then made us aware that the orange flesh variety, for example, is in demand in the United Arab Emirates in addition to markets that exist in the region in countries like Namibia and South Africa,” said Ms Maphala.
The ZimTrade clusters programme began in 2022 and has been rolled it out across the country’s 10 provinces, recognising what each of the provinces has as the easiest economically viable activity which can be used for export. So in the Midlands province, in addition to a few other crops, sweet potatoes was also recognised as one of the key crops that could be targeted for export.
