Chronicle Editor
Sikhulekelani Moyo,[email protected]
BULAWAYO Vendors and Traders Association (BVTA) in collaboration with the Ministry of Woman Affairs, Community, Small and Medium Enterprises Development and Agriculture Advisory Services (Agritex) is working on a market linkage project targeting farmers in the outskirts of Bulawayo to connect them with markets for the easy sale of produce in Bulawayo.
The Nkulumane fruits and vegetable market is a project being driven by the Ministry of Local Government and Public Works under the Building Urban Resilience in Zimbabwe through the ‘Safe Markets and Green Solutions’ programme.
It is being implemented in line with the Government’s deliberate thrust and efforts to formalise the Micro, Small to Medium Enterprises entailed by the national vision of an upper middle-income economy by 2030 under the National Development Strategy 1 (NDS1).
The construction of the fruit and vegetable market comes after an extensive assessment and realisation of the need to support decentralisation of safe markets.
The wholesale market will ensure that producers are selling from well-established infrastructure.
BVTA has indicated that visits to Umguza district farms to map out farmers in that community have been done.
The broader idea is to create a market linkage project to help farmers connect with markets.
Once connected with markets, that will guarantee an established selling point which will guide them on the type of produce to grow and supply.
“With Agritex, Ministry of Women Affairs, Community, Small Medium Enterprise Development and Community Affairs we are mapping agri-produce in different wards to facilitate aggregating the produce from smallholder farmers to feed into the fresh fruit and vegetable market in Nkulumane,” BVTA said.
The Nkulumane Urban Resilience project is the second to be rolled out in the region after one was opened in Gwanda in January 2022.
SMEs have become dominant economic players in Zimbabwe but a majority of them still operate informally. Small holder farmers continue to suffer post-harvest losses due to a lack of secure markets and facilities to reserve their products.
Hence the Nkulumane market will provide a market for farm produce as well as decongesting the city by receiving all traders from Bulawayo and outside as it is strategically positioned, fostering a resilient Bulawayo from pandemics and other external shocks.
Recently, BVTA had a stakeholder meeting where discussions on how they can bring convenient and safe shopping options to the community, while also alleviating congestion in the CBD were discussed.
During the meeting, BVTA executive director Mr Michael Ndiweni said: “This program seeks to feed into the Bulawayo City Council decongesting strategy through complimenting the strategy by bringing goods and services closer to the people and their communities”.
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