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Pathogenic fungi pose a huge and growing threat to global food security. Currently, we protect our crops against fungal disease by spraying them with anti-fungal chemistries, also known as fungicides. However, the growing threat of microbial resistance against these chemistries requires continuous development of new fungicides. A consortium of researchers from the University of Exeter,…
By Charles Dhewa African countries are called less industrialized economies for genuine reasons. If the majority of people in a country depend on more than 80 agricultural commodities and less than 10 can be turned into processed products, such a country is obviously less industrialized. For instance, in Zimbabwe, only maize meal, flour, sugar, wheat…
By Veritas Earlier this month the Minister of Lands, Agriculture, Water and Rural Resettlement gazetted a set of regulations ‒ the Land Commission (Gazetted Land)(Disposal in Lieu of Compensation) Regulations, 2020 (SI 62 of 2020) [link] ‒ which provided for the return of farms to two classes of farmers who had been dispossessed during the land reform…
As the COVID-19 pandemic takes hold in Africa, many governments have begun to tighten borders, restrict gatherings and close schools. The crisis has already fundamentally changed people’s lives not just with regards to public health but in terms of politics, the economy, public services, and much more. What about food systems? One thing that cannot…
Chinese purchases of US grains have been quite scant since the coronavirus epidemic hit the country, despite the phase one trade agreement being signed by both nations back in January. China pledged to buy an additional US$12.5 billion worth of agricultural goods in 2020 compared to the 2017 level of US$24 billion. Many analysts have…
Governments and financial institutions are under growing pressure to make economic bailouts designed to counter the coronavirus pandemic dependent on climate action in the longer term. Over the last week, hundreds of billions of dollars worth of stopgap measures have been announced to fight the coronavirus and limit economic shortfalls. In the US, industries are…
By Charles Dhewa Post-harvest handling and storage of agriculture commodities remain the biggest challenge for the majority of African smallholders. Unfortunately, most solutions being pushed are designed to get surplus commodities moving quickly from farming areas to the market and consumers. Solutions that enable farmers to hold onto their commodities and sell profitably rather…
Agriculture 4.0, the next agricultural revolution will need to look at the demand side and the value chain/supply side of the food-scarcity equation, using technology not simply for the sake of innovation, but to improve and address the real needs of consumers and re-engineer the value chain. The world is expected to grow by 33%…
By Anyway Yotamu. One of the country’s energy companies, Sakunda Holdings has told the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament that the total amount spent on Command Agriculture was US$1 Billion in the four years the programme was implemented and not US$3 Billion as widely shared by the committee. Giving oral evidence before PAC on its…
By Charles Dhewa African agriculture requires banks with a vision to invest in infrastructure which can be used by farmers to anchor production in ways that simplify loan repayment. For instance, Vision 2030 should have financial products that speak to a 10-year horizon. Financing inputs is just like providing consumer loans that do not have…
By Joyce Mukucha The impacts of climate disasters have continued to make headlines around the world and this has seen cases of gender-based violence, including sexual harassment, domestic violence and sexual exploitation increasing amongst rural based girls and women. Research and statistics indicate that floods, wildfires, and droughts are decimating communities across the globe. Already,…
Tens of thousands of people across Zimbabwe, Malawi and Mozambique are still suffering 12 months after Cyclone Idai battered Southern Africa, warned Oxfam yesterday. Cyclone Idai, one of the worst cyclones to hit Africa, made landfall on 14th March 2019. A new Oxfam briefing, ‘After the Storm,’ highlights that over 100,000 people in Mozambique and…
By Anyway Yotamu Government has rolled out a massive irrigation programme targeting 100 thousand hectares which will be turned into green belts of maize and other strategic crops under the smart agriculture concept. The Command Agriculture programme has moved a gear up, with several farmers who have reliable sources of water being targeted under the…
By Charles Dhewa All over the world, information sources are no longer just important for journalists. African policy makers who really want to transform their agro-based economies cannot afford to remain silent about their sources of information. There is emerging consensus to the effect that information from academic institutions, private companies and development agencies is…
The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has welcomed a contribution of $3 million CAD from the Canadian Government to life-saving humanitarian operations in Zimbabwe. The funding supports WFP’s rapid scale-up of emergency food assistance to reach almost 55,000 people in Matobo district. Canada’s contribution comes at a crucial time when WFP is working to…
The Deputy Minister of Lands, Agriculture, Water and Rural Resettlement, Mr Vangelis Haritatos has said that the agricultural sector is the most significant prime-mover of Zimbabwe’s Vision 2030. He made the remarks at the two-day consultative workshop on the Enabling Business of Agriculture (EBA), pillar 1 of AGRINVEST Initiative that kicked off in Harare today….
By Charles Dhewa There has been a general tendency by developing countries to cherry-pick and deploy some components of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in the agriculture sector. Combining infrastructure and ICTs could play a more catalytic role than just using ICTs for promoting extension services. If African countries are going to produce sufficient agricultural…
Canada is investing in the Canadian Agri-Food Sustainability Initiative (CASI) to boost sustainability and build public trust in its agriculture sector. Marie-Claude Bibeau, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, announced a federal investment of C$560,000 for the Canadian Federation of Agriculture (CFA) to develop the initiative. It will provide Canadian farmers and processors an online national…
By Joyce Mukucha and Anyway Yotamu Considering that 70 percent of the population in Africa is constituted by small-holder farmers, Oxfam in conjunction with the Food, Agriculture and Natural Resources Policy Analysis Network (FANRPAN) is working tirelessly to create an enabling environment to transform agriculture markets for the small holder farming households. The main thrust…
By Charles Dhewa Days of doing research for its own sake are numbered in developing countries. The same applies to an enduring tendency by researchers to be satisfied with publishing research findings into journals. Many African researchers are waking up to the fact that academic excellence will not solve teething challenges like mass poverty and…
he African Development Bank (https://www.AfDB.org) urged development finance institutions, NGOs, farmer cooperatives, and the private sector to develop more effective financing solutions for Africa’s fertilizer value chains. The Bank’s call to action came during the Argus Africa Fertilizer Conference held on 19 February. The conference’s theme was Supporting the fertilizer value chain to improve agricultural productivity…
By Joyce Mukucha and Anyway Yotamu In an effort to support the agricultural sector and eradicate hunger and poverty in Zimbabwe, the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) has handed over a substantial donation to the Horticulture Development Council (HDC), a parastatal which operates under the Ministry of Lands, Agriculture,Water,Rural Resettlement. The…
By Charles Dhewa In spite of presence in rural areas by African governments and development agencies there are still no meaningful pathways for uplifting communities out of poverty. A recent trend has seen development agencies working through some kind of consortia in one rural district or county but still after three or four years…
By Anyway Yotamu The Grain Millers Association of Zimbabwe (GMAZ) submitted a fourth letter to Parliament in a bid to evade being grilled by legislators under the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Lands, Agriculture, Water and Rural Resettlement over US$27 million they received from the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe. GMAZ was set to appear for hearing…
Global Renaissance Investments have earmarked an international Infrastructure Summit and Expo involving South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe that will take place in the resort town of Victoria Falls from 4 to 7 March 2020 at the famous Kingdom Hotel. Addressing journalists at the five-star Meikles Hotel in Harare today, Mr. Ngoni Dzirutwe, the Chief Executive…
Leaders acknowledged the scope of the challenge but sounded a note of optimism African countries have made progress toward eradicating malnutrition and stunting but need to do more to hit United Nations malnutrition targets by 2025. This was the main message of a meeting that took place during the 33rd African Union Summit. Speakers at…
The Environmental Management Agency, Birdlife Zimbabwe, NetOne, and Haka Game Park, among other stakeholders have joined hands in commemorating the belated World Wetlands Day under the theme, “Wetlands and Biodiversity.” This day marks the date of the adoption of the Convention on Wetlands on February 2, 1971, in the Iranian city of Ramsar, therefore the…
Mr. William Kojo Agyemang-Bonsu, the Manager of the Mitigation and Transparency Support (Mitigation, Data and Analysis) unit of the United Nations Climate Change Secretariat has commended Zimbabwe stakeholder collaboration towards coming up with quality greenhouse gases inventory reports. “As per our assessment, the work that has been carried out is fair in the sense…
Mr. Alois Tsiga, the Project Coordinator for the Fourth National Communications and First Biennial Update under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) for Zimbabwe has said there are low hanging fruits for the country in complying with such requirements. Speaking to Spiked Online Media in Harare today, Mr. Tsiga revealed that national…
The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization has described the recent invasion of deserts locust in the East African region as “the worst experience in the past 25 years.” The invasion has presented a major threat to food security and impacted negatively on farming and pastoral communities in the region. The destructive desert locust has…
Cellulant Corporation (www.Cellulant.com) – the pan-African technology company – has empowered Africa’s agriculture sector with the hosting of its inaugural partners’ summit in Lagos, Nigeria and the assurance to leverage on technology to help block inefficiency and wastages in Africa’s Agric value chain courtesy of its improved payment and marketplace solutions, Tingg and Agrikore. Tingg,…
By Charles Dhewa Once raw materials leave Africa for other parts of the world, there is no clear pathway fir re-investing back. The structure of the global economy is such that Africans who migrate to the diaspora will not be able to re-invest back home as much as they would want. Likewise those who leave…
By Charles Dhewa Instead of shelling out all the land to the current generation, African countries should leave much land uncommitted so that future generations will decide new uses at the time. In fact land should be considered a fluid resource like knowledge. Why should a fundamental natural resource like land be tied to…
By Anyway Yotamu The Minister of Industry and Commerce, Dr Sekai Nzenza has issued a stern warning to retailers against hoarding of the maize meal with regards the Roller Meal subsidy programme. The statement comes as retail shops are reportedly running out of maize meal due to panic buying by shoppers and hoarding by some…
By Rebecca Smith Growing weed at home is an excellent way of keeping your supply steady. Growing marijuana also heightens your love and attachment to the plant because you get to experience and observe each growth phase of cannabis. Marijuana use continues to increase day in and day out due to its numerous medicinal and…
By Charles Dhewa While economists have been schooled into projecting agricultural income starting from the size of the land, such an approach is now found wanting in the knowledge economy. There is no doubt that land is important but evaluating natural resources for investment purposes should go beyond hectares of land to the quality of…
By Dr Vandana Shiva George Monbiot’s Lab-grown food will soon destroy farming – and save the planet is a dystopian vision of the future, with no people on the land, and humans eating fake food produced in giant industrial factories by genetically engineered microbes. As Monbiot concludes in his article “Farmfree food will…
A record 45 million people – mostly women and children – in the 16-nation Southern African Development Community are gravely food insecure following repeated drought, widespread flooding and economic disarray. As the crisis deepens, the world must step up now to save lives and enable communities to adapt to climate change, the United Nations World…
The Zimbabwe Civil Society Organisations Scaling Up Nutrition Alliance (ZCSOSUNA) is calling on the government of Zimbabwe to make attainable and measurable commitments in preparation for the 2020 Japan Nutrition for Growth Summit. “As the country’s Civil Society Alliance in Scaling Up Nutrition, we applaud the government of Zimbabwe for making a commitment during the…
The European Union has mobilised an additional 16.8 million EUR (approx. 18.7 million USD) to help address emergency food needs and support vulnerable people in Zimbabwe. The funding comes as large parts of the country and the wider region of Southern Africa are in the grip of the harshest drought in decades, which is compounded…
By Charles Dhewa African smallholder farmers are not the only ones famous for producing commodities before conducting market research. Corporates are not immune to such a disease. Instead of investing in market research, most African corporate companies prefer monopolising the air waves, bill boards along urban roads and mainstream print media with advertisements. The consequences…
By Joyce Mukucha and Anyway Yotamu The newly appointed United Nations (UN) Resident Coordinator to Zimbabwe Ms Mario Rebeiro has paid a courtesy call to the Vice President Kembo Mohadi at his Munhumutapa Offices in Harare to discuss issues concerning food security in Zimbabwe. Speaking to the press on the 10th of January 2020,VP Mohadi…
It is one thing to be blessed with natural resources such as fertile soils and water but quite another to be able to explain and convince investors about opportunities embedded in those resources. Given the intensifying competition for investment and influence, the art of articulating opportunities can no longer be a preserve for government officials…
By Joyce Mukucha and Anyway Yotamu Oil Castor Zimbabwe has promised to eliminate the fuel crisis currently prevailing in the nation through producing and supplying bio motor oil extracted from castor bean plant. The company, through its chemistry and engineering department revealed plans to set up a fully-fledged market in Zimbabwe by releasing 20W40 Bio-motor oil and…
By Joyce Mukucha As climate change adverse effects persist around the globe, most women and young girls residing in urban-distant communities are becoming more affected as they bear the brunt of the negative impacts. Due to negative impacts posed by climate change, marginalised women and girls encounter violence, financial instability and child marriage among other…
