Online Reporter
Theseus Shambare in BULAWAYO
The Government has ordered agricultural parastatals to urgently transform into high-impact production and business engines capable of boosting food security, creating jobs and driving economic growth.
This is expected to strengthen Zimbabwe’s march towards self-sufficiency and Vision 2030.
The directive, issued at the ongoing Zimbabwe International Trade Fair 2026, places key State Enterprises at the centre of efforts to grow the economy through agriculture, value addition, irrigation development and rural industrialisation.
Parastatals under the Ministry of Agriculture, Mechanisation and Water Resources Development, and the Ministry of Lands and Rural Development include the Agricultural and Rural Development Authority, AFC Land and Development Bank, Kutsaga, Agricultural Marketing Authority, Silo Food Industries, Grain Marketing Board and Zimbabwe National Water Authority.
These institutions are expected to give practical meaning to this year’s ZITF theme, “Connected Economies, Competitive Industries,” by linking farmers to finance, research, water, markets and processing industries.
Speaking after touring exhibition stands on Wednesday, Permanent Secretary Professor Obert Jiri said the era of parastatals operating as passive administrative bodies was over.
“Our parastatals must innovate for growth.They must contribute to greater food security, greater nutritional security, economic development and agricultural-led economic development. They must contribute to what we believe in, which is rural transformation and agricultural transformation,” said Prof Jiri.
The renewed thrust comes as Government intensifies efforts to build strategic grain reserves, cut imports and ensure stable supplies of wheat, maize and other staples.
Prof Jiri said the institutions must become relevant in both commercial farming areas and rural communities through programmes that unlock productivity and income generation.
He said water agencies should accelerate full dam utilisation, irrigation schemes, fisheries, hydropower and water reticulation projects to turn communities into active economic participants.
Stronger performance by these entities, Prof Jiri said, could increase exports, reduce food imports, create rural jobs and deepen industrial growth anchored on agriculture.
The policy push is already visible at Agricultural and Rural Development Authority (ARDA), which has begun winter cropping operations targeting 65 000 hectares of wheat this season.
That accounts for 52 percent of the national 125 000-hectare wheat target expected to yield around 300 000 metric tonnes, a major pillar of Zimbabwe’s wheat self-sufficiency drive.
ARDA chief executive officer Mr Tinotenda Mhiko said the authority was confident of strong yields.
“We have already started winter production and our target is 65 000 hectares. Farmers under our contract model are expecting yields of between five and seven tonnes per hectare,” he said.
He said ARDA was also spearheading rural industrialisation through production-linked processing, storage and logistics chains.
Meanwhile, AFC Land and Development Bank managing director Mrs Priscilla Munyeza said the bank was ready to support farmers through quick-turnaround loans and mechanisation packages.
“We are ready to support farmers through quick loans as well as mechanisation equipment so that they can produce efficiently and on time,” she said.
Reflecting the broader innovation drive across State enterprises, Kutsaga Research Head of Business Development and Marketing Mrs Mavis Rukweza Nyakachiranje said the institution had diversified beyond tobacco into disease-free plant production using advanced tissue culture technology.
“We have undergone a world-class transformation. We now have a cutting-edge tissue culture laboratory and we are no longer centred on tobacco only, but a wide range of disease-free plants,” she said.
