Zimbabwe around late 19th century was admired by the British Business mogul and imperialist Cecil John Rhodes after he perceived that in the land there is lot of gold like in South Africa.
Rhodes sent his concession team to persuade the then powerful king Lobengula to give them permission to do mining in the Mashonaland.
After Rhodes identified that there is no suficient minerals ,but the land is suitable for other enterprises such as farming,He resort to agricuture.
The Shona and Ndebele people later realised that the Whites are not their saviours but rather colonisers of their land.The land struggle dates back from this era until today Zimbabwe politics is still centred on land question.
What is Zimbabwe's economy on Agriculture?
AGRICULTURE: Zimbabwe experiences a wide range of temperature,rainfall and soil conditions which are good for various agricultural enterprises.Most of Zimbabwe areas receives a lot of rainfall in summer season which range from October to April.
The eastern highlands receives over 1000mm of rainfall per annum and is very reliable in these places.The farmers mainly specialised in decidious fruits,potatoes,timber plantations and very intensive livestork ranching including sheep rearing.
The most parts of Mashonaland including Harare,Mutare,Masvingo,Gweru and surrounding places has rainfall range of 600mm to 800mm per year and these places are where Maize the national staple food grown,tobacco,horticultural crops, and intensive to semi-intensive livestork ranching done.
The lowveld and Zambezi valley including the Bulawayo and surrounding places receives rainfall below 400mm and is very unreliable.The most successful enterprises in Agriculture include cattle ranching,cotton under irrigation and sugarcane plantations.
A great potential also exists for the production of irrigated crops during the winter cropping.Soils vary throughout the country ,for the most part they are sandy granite based areas. Heavy red and black soils are found in some places around the whole country.
Recent years have been marked by an impressive development in the adoption of advanced production techniques.With large scale commercial and peasant farming ,aided by a wide range of government assistance .The agriculture sector developed to the point at which it contributes a major share of the country 's GDP and creates employment to the 80% of the workforce.
However the development was slowed down since 2000 after the Zimbabwe government succumbed to the pressure of the war veterans who lost patience with the Lancaster House conference which has agreed to facilitate the land redistribution to the landless majority.
The dispute between Harare and London results in violent land redistribution dabbed 'fast track' which led to Zimbabwe being isolated and sanctioned to the point that inflation and devalued Zimbabwe dollar eventually left into the dust bin.
After the formation of all inclusive government and adoption of multi-currency in February 2009 the situation is now back to normal.
The commercial sector and subsistence sector is now recieving support from government ,international donors and other financial sectors.
The support range from technical support,education and extension services,marketing facilities , better seeds and improved techniques of production such as conservation farming and water management.
Other services which still rendered by the government include testing of,new crops such as cereals,horticultural and regumes by Variety Testing Centre (VTC) and livestork research facilities ,veterinary control and research services, such as Handerson for veterinary,Kutsaga for Tobacco,Kadoma for cotton and Grasslands for horticulture.
Conservation farming is now offered by the NGOs through research done by Foundations of Farming sponsored by a church organisation Rivers of life ministries.
Marketing facilities provided by government is through boards such as Tobacco Marketing Board(TIMB),Grain Marketing Board(GMB) ,Cotton Company of Zimbabwe(COTTCO),Dairy board Zimbabwe and Cold storage company.They provide marketing services outright at fixed or floor prices ,like for example grains ,cattle and milk ,tobacco at the auction floors for regulatory control over marketing inorder to maintain stability.
The Government trained extension officers to help farmers in rural areas to increase production.
Research work undertaken in recent years at several agricultural research stations in the country resulted in substantial increased yields of agriculture produce .The agricultural colleges increased from two to 14 around the country,since 1980.Universities also increased as open university and other private institutions are providing training for the generation of farmers.
The government blueprint STERP was planned to revamp comprehensively the agricultural sector to realise economic turnaround stratergy.This would increased exports ,expand employment creation and generate enough raw materials for the the africulture and manufacturing industries. The project became successful.
The tobacco output in 2009-2010 season increased by 144% than the previous season.Grain production also increased ,eventhough affected by drought this season.
The government 's major plans to construct dams developed very well to have more irrigation facilities all over the country.
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