adminMunyaradzi Musiiwa and Sukoluhle Ndlovu
GOVERNMENT will this year introduce a new model of agriculture where each district in the country will receive irrigation equipment to irrigate at least 200 hectares each year for the next 10 years, President Mnangagwa has said.
Addressing multitudes of Zanu-PF supporters at Mvuma Stadium on Saturday, President Mnangagwa said Government has embarked on a massive agricultural programme where districts will be identifying water bodies and land for irrigation.
He said Government will every year for the next 10 years provide irrigation equipment for at least 200 hectares to all districts.
President Mnangagwa said it was incumbent upon Government to ensure food security at household level as espoused in the Zimbabwe Agenda for Sustainable Socio Economic Transformation (Zim-Asset).He said it was imperative for every district to have at least 200 ha under irrigation so that they become self sufficient.
“We are saying to hunger goodbye. Hatichaide zvachose. This year we are bringing in a new agricultural model. We sat down and said if we do not receive enough rains we still have dams and other water bodies in the country. We then asked ourselves that how many hectares we should put under irrigation so that we have adequate food in the country and ensure food security.
“We realised that we required 320 000 ha to be put under irrigation and at the moment we have 152 000 ha. That is why you saw that in our budget we said we want every district to have at least 200 ha under irrigation. So every district in the country should prepare 200 ha for irrigation and we are going to give them equipment. So each year for the next 10 years we should ensure that 200 ha per district are put under irrigation. This means after 10 years each district will have at least 200 ha under irrigation,” he said.
President Mnangagwa said Government was getting support from Brazil, India, China and Belarus for its new agriculture model.
“Our land must be productive. We grow cotton, maize, soyabeans and other crops in this country. So for our agriculture to be more productive we need to mechanise and mordenise it and that is the responsibility of Government. We have programmes with Brazil, India, China and Belarus tailor-made for our agriculture sector.
After mechanisation we want value addition and beneficiation,” he said.
Online Reporter