Mpopoma High to set up uniforms factory

Mashudu Netsianda, Senior Reporter
GOVERNMENT is assisting Mpopoma High School in Bulawayo to acquire a stand to set up a factory to manufacture uniforms, Primary and Secondary Education Minister Cain Mathema has said.

The Minister Mathema said this was in line with the new thrust for schools to engage in income generating projects. Minister Mathema said some schools are already manufacturing PPEs that are essential in the fight against Covid-19. Speaking in Parliament during the question and answer session, Minister Mathema said Government is also working on ensuring that every school is empowered or is allowed to engage in business.

“We have many schools that have large pieces of land and almost all our schools have a lot of land. For example, Mpopoma High has 2 500 learners and all those learners still buy their school uniforms from other manufacturers yet at the same time we are teaching Fashion and Fabrics or Textile Technology,” he said.

“I am in the middle of assisting that school to have a stand in Bulawayo opposite the teachers’ college near Mpilo, UCE, so that they are given a stand to start their own factory for our learners to learn in the classroom and see what their school is doing in terms of producing school uniforms.”

Minister Mathema said schools like Chipindura in Bindura are into dairy production. “Every day they produce milk which they sell and they have used the monies to build classroom blocks and the administration block. Every school, in addition to the assistance they get from the Ministry of Finance, should have income generating projects,” he said.

“We have for instance Fatima in Lupane which has over 400ha of land but that piece of land is not being used commercially. So schools have been allowed to engage the private sector to assist in this regard. Companies could engage in commercial activities with the school on a build, operate and transfer (BOT) basis.” Minister Mathema said his ministry, through Treasury, has also procured some Covid-19 PPE.

“The majority of the beneficiary schools are the disadvantaged rural schools. We have also encouraged our schools with capacity to prepare their own masks. Some of the rural schools have been forthcoming in this regard,” he said.

The Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education, working in conjunction with the Ministry of Health and Child Care and the National Task Force on Covid-19 came up with SOP in schools to protect learners and teachers from contracting the pandemic.-@mashnets.