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Elton Manguwo
THE stage is set for a successful summer cropping season following the Government’s successful fine-tuning of last season’s shortcomings in agronomic practices, capacitation of extension services staff and strengthening the observation of the climate-proofed Pfumvudza/Intwasa concept’s tenets.
“The poor productivity that manifested itself in the previous season is as a result of a number factors. However, the Government has introduced a number of programmes aimed at alleviating the problems and ensuring food security for the nation,” Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development Minister Dr Anxious Masuka said this in a speech delivered on his behalf by his deputy Vangelis Haritatos.
The Government has increased traditional grain production with inputs for the Pfumvudza programme this time being distributed according to agro-ecological zones to ensure optimised production for every natural region.
Dr Masuka added: “The Pfumvudza programme, which was adopted by the Government has been remodelled to attend to the demands of low productivity and low profitability of farming, which continue to negatively impact the food security situation in the country.”
The Government released $20 billion Zimbabwe dollars towards the goal of climate proofing small-scale production, as it targets 3, 5 million households for this year’s Presidential input scheme under the Pfumvudza/Intwasa programme. The extension of the programme is to ensure that small-scale farmers are food secure while they can still satisfy the business side of farming.
To combat poor agronomic practices, the Government has capacitated the extension workers with modern tablets for easy communication and motorbikes for easy mobility and easy access to hard to reach areas, as the Government aims to ensure no farmer is left behind.
In addition, there will be refresher courses focusing on equipping the extension workers with the needed technical information, as the country heads into the 2022/23 summer cropping season. The Ministry is also restructuring extension services to enable them to be the originating point of mainstreaming business practices in agriculture.
“This season’s refresher courses will hammer on the Government’s thrust of farmers taking farming as a business. As the Government moves to invest in the commercialisation of rural agriculture through the Rural Development agenda,” added Minister Masuka.
Furthermore, the Government is fast tracking the implementation of the blitz soil conditioning programme that involves soil liming and mechanised creation of contours as a counter measure to soil acidity and soil losses through soil erosion respectively.
Climate change impacts are characterised by poor rainfall during the season, prolonged mid-season dry spells and very high temperatures during the season.
Therefore, the Ministry continues to make efforts in roping in the participation of the private sector through various Government led programmes in order to grow the area under irrigation as Government now targets 420 000 hectares by 2024.
Government initially set a target of 350 000ha under irrigation by 2024 but has since revised it upwards.
Online Reporter