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Nqobile Bhebhe, Senior Business Reporter

GOVERNMENT’S deliberate thrust of building dams countrywide is fast driving the country towards food security and back on track to being the continent’s food basket, Finance and Economic Development Minister, Professor Mthuli Ncube, has said.

In view of the growing climate change risks and the need to enhance resilience building and adaptation capabilities, the Second Republic led by President Mnangagwa has prioritised the building of more dams.

To buttress the drive, Treasury has been allocating more resources to these projects through the national budgets while development partners have also chipped in to assist in rehabilitating several irrigation schemes.

Speaking in Bulawayo on Monday, where he delivered a public lecture to tertiary students at the National University of Science and Technology (Nust), Prof Ncube said dam construction was part of a broader plan towards food security under the National Development Strategy 1.

He told the students, who were drawn from Nust, Lupane State University, Zimbabwe School of Mines, Bulawayo Polytechnic, and Hillside Teachers’ College, that the country was witnessing rapid transformation in various sectors of the economy. That growth is contributing to food security, he said.

“We are seeing a transformation in the agricultural sector. In 2021, we achieved a bumper harvest, the highest production grain since 1982, and almost three million metric tonnes of grain,” said Prof Ncube.

“In 2022, we produced enough wheat to feed ourselves and we should be able to import anything more than 375 000 metric tonnes.”

While the rest of the world is struggling to find wheat due to global tensions, Zimbabwe has enough wheat, a testimony that the strategy of building dams in every province and investing in convenience infrastructure, which is the irrigation infrastructure, equipping our farmers with right skills and also giving farmers tractors through financial structures is paying off, said the minister.

Prof Ncube made reference to Bubi-Lupane Dam in Matabeleland North where an irrigation scheme was set up to produce wheat in sandy soils.

President Mnangagwa launched the Bubi-Lupane Irrigation Schemes in 2021, which was identified as a pilot project for an integrated business model to be replicated across all provinces in the country as part of the National Food Security Strategy.

The irrigation scheme, which is situated in Mpofu Village under Chief Mabhikwa area, has been turned into a green belt and is one of the flagship Government projects that symbolises hope for nearly 100 families.

Bubi-Lupane Irrigation Scheme is transforming subsistence agriculture at household level into commercial agriculture as part of rural development and industrialisation in line with Vision 2030.

“In those sandy soils, we are producing wheat because we invested in the agronomy research that has enabled us to grow the right type of wheat, which is thriving.

“Villages around that project are shareholders and also supply labour, which means they are earning twice,” said Prof Ncube.

“It’s an incredible model that has transformed villagers in the Bubi area and we want to replicate that model in every province,” he noted.

The minister said when the project is replicated, agro-industrial hubs would be developed and fed into a higher value chain and that feeds into President Mnangagwa’s philosophy of ‘leaving no one and no place behind’.

“With the Second Republic’s policy of leaving no one and no place behind, rural development initiatives are a significant milestone in improving the welfare and livelihoods of Zimbabweans,” he said.

The major objective under Food Security and Nutrition Security as articulated under NDS-1 is to improve food self-sufficiency and to retain the regional breadbasket status and also increase food self-sufficiency from the current level of 45 percent to 100 percent.

“Through the Rural Development 8.0 programme the country is set to reclaim its glory of being the breadbasket of Africa.

“The development of agriculture will lead to rural industrialisation, resulting in the attainment of Vision 2030 wheat production, the country surpassed targets as the area put under wheat production kept on increasing from 65 667 hectares in 2021 to 78 063 hectares in 2022 due to increased participation of the private sector in the programme,” said Prof Ncube.

“Wheat production had a record high of 337 212 tonnes in 2021 and reached another record of 375 131 tonnes in 2022.”

The minister also noted remarkable improvement in terms of milk production during the first two years of NDS1 implementation.

“Dairy production as of 31 Dec 2022 stood at 91,4 million litres, 1,8 percent higher than the 2021 same-period output of 79,6 million litres. The dairy herd increased by 33 percent. A positive trend is anticipated to continue until the end of the year,” he said.

Prof Ncube said other objectives are to reduce food insecurity from a high of 59 percent recorded in 2020 to less than 10 percent by 2025, increase maize production from 907 629 tonnes in 2020 to three million tonnes by 2025 and increase beef production from 49  115 tonnes in 2020 to 110 000 tonnes by 2025.

To enhance food production, Prof Ncube said the Government has introduced several programmes such as Pfumvudza/Intwasa programme (Presidential Input Support Programme), National Enhanced Agriculture Productivity Scheme, National Accelerated Irrigation Rehabilitation and Development Plan, farm mechanisation programme and decentralisation of soil testing services.