Ministers attend NEPAD meeting

Foreign Affairs Minister Simbarashe Mumbengegwi and Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development Minister Dr Joseph Made attended the 31st session of the NEPAD Heads of States and Governments orientation committee which was held at Sipopo Conference Centre in Malabo on Wednesday.Minister Made gave a presentation on the Zimbabwean experience since the land reform programme and said Zimbabwe had been pushing on its own to support the agricultural sector and now the sector was doing well.

He talked about the Presidential inputs support scheme that supported over 1,5 million households during last cropping season and resulted in significant rise in food crops, especially maize.

Minister Made said tobacco farmers increased from 1 800 before the land reform programme to 102 000.

Earlier on, Minister Mumbengegwi attended the Sadc Ministers of Foreign Affairs meeting which was held at Sipopo Conference Centre.

Minister Mumbengegwi said the ministers discussed two major issues in preparation of the joint meeting to be held between Sadc ministers and their counterparts from the Great Lakes Region on the 1st and 2nd of next month in Rwanda.

The issues related to the situation in the DRC where a few months ago the Congolese armed forces assisted by the Sadc intervention forces were able to defeat the M23 rebels, the FDI rebels as well as a group of rebels who were causing unrest in Rwanda. — ZBC.