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Failure to plan is certainly a recipe for failure. The summer agricultural season is upon us and preparations for the summer cropping season are underway around the country. The past seasons have not been good since the rainfall has been erratic with some areas affected by drought.
The rainfall patterns have been such that even though the seasonal totals could be impressive, the rainfall distribution over the months would be so poor that crops fail in many areas.
Such rainfall patterns should have jolted policy makers into action to ensure that the country’s food security is not jeopardised regardless of the rainfall distribution in a particular season.
Yesterday we carried an article in which Zimbabwe was reported to have secured a US$98 million loan from Brazil to fund the mechanisation of the agricultural sector, including rehabilitation of irrigation schemes to boost Zimbabwe’s food security.
We learn that the money would be loaned to farmers to procure equipment such as tractors, with some of the funds going towards resuscitating irrigation schemes.
“The loan from Brazil will make it easy for our farmers to access cheap lines of credit to buy critical equipment such as tractors as we seek to mechanise our agricultural sector to enhance food security,” said Deputy Minister of Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development Cde Davis Marapira.
Our view is that what needs to be done to improve food production in the country is known and that we have had a lot of speeches on the need to get irrigation schemes in all the provinces around the country working again.
What remains, however, is implementation of the grand plans of this agricultural revolution whose fulcrum would be irrigation.
The mechanisation of our agriculture has already commenced but it is sad that some of the equipment has been poorly maintained while some recipients simply hoarded equipment they had no use for.
We urge the Government to ensure that its programmes yield intended results through close monitoring.
While the smallholder farmers could be catered for under such loan arrangements, the majority of our people in the communal areas may not qualify for such credit lines even though in drier parts of the country they have lost draught power to drought over the years.
We believe the Government should also move swiftly to capacitate the District Development Fund so that its tractors are repaired to help in land preparation and, where possible, new tractors and ploughs bought to help farmers in tilling their land.
Timing is crucial in planning hence the need to ensure that these interventions are made before the rainy season.
In irrigation, there is a need to explore systems that can sustain a bigger hectarage using less water, such as drip irrigation.
We believe the resuscitation of irrigation schemes run by the Agricultural Rural Development Authority, smaller ones in all the provinces and ensuring that new dams have a percentage of their water dedicated towards irrigation will go a long way in eradicating hunger through ensuring all-year-round food production by taking advantage of rain-fed summer cropping and the irrigated crop thereafter.
It is either we adapt or perish, especially in view of climate change dynamics that have seen our rainfall patterns become more and more unpredictable.
Failure is not an option.
Online Reporter