Zimbabwe lacks comprehensive agriculture policy – The Financial Gazette
Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement Minister Perrance Shiri
ZIMBABWE’S lack of a comprehensive agricultural policy and related sub-sector strategies is a major threat to the country’s agro productivity, the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) has said.
The country’s economy is agro-based.
Addressing the 6th Annual Agri-business Conference in Harare last week, FAO assistant head of programmes David Mfote said while the sector has great potential to drive Zimbabwe’s economic growth, it was subdued due to a number of factors.
“The absence of an overarching agricultural policy framework and related sub-sectoral strategies has become a threat to agricultural production,” he said.
“Secondly, land tenure insecurity hampers corporates and individual investments,” Mfote said.
“The country also faces challenges of trans-boundary crop pests and animal diseases, such as fall army worm, foot and mouth disease and Avian Influenza,” he said, adding that “the country also faces challenges with respect to climate change — severe temperatures and high carbon emissions that cause droughts, floods and heat waves,” he said.
The absence of funding is also a factor, Mfote said.
“The share of commercial loans to agriculture has been declining from 19 percent in 2012 to around 16 percent due to perceived high risk in agriculture lending,” he added.
Mfote said in Zimbabwe, financiers lack confidence in long term capital investments such as irrigation, while they do not recognize farm land and immoveable rural assets as collateral.
He also cited the country’s poor roads as negatively affecting farming household’s productivity and access to markets.
Mfote recommended that comprehensive agriculture and land policies should be government’s priority, taking into account the country’s agricultural structure.
“Design of agricultural and food security policies and strategies should take into account the structure of the agriculture sector. Zimbabwe’s agricultural sector still remains predominantly smallholder-led, with over a million smallholder farmers relying on rain-fed agriculture and close to 70 percent of them making a livelihood on less than two hectares,” he said.