Editor’s Brief
Victoria Ruzvidzo

Zimbabweans are no longer just good at talking. They have become doers. No wonder the economy is scoring highly on many fronts.

A lot is happening on the ground. Projects are being implemented left, right and centre and many of them are registering immense success. An Upper Middle Income Economy is within reach if this trend continues.

This week I was pleasantly surprised when I had occasion to visit the Traditional Grains Producers Association offices and demo fields in Gunhill at the invitation of agriculture expert and chairperson of the organisation Mr Basil Nyabadza. His invitation was elicited by my piece last week on the launch of the Agricultural Finance Corporation. He felt it had struck the right cord.

Mr Nyabadza is a former Agricultural and Rural Development Authority (ARDA) chairman.

The visit opened my eyes to the realities on the ground. Farmers, many of them in rural areas, are growing hectares of ginger, garlic and turmeric, from which they are earning lots of foreign currency.

In some instances, a small piece of land accommodating six standard beds can produce enough crop to sustain livelihoods and generate income for other revenue streams where need be.

The rush for these new crops is changing lifestyles. Who would have thought a woman in rural Buhera could open a nostro account into which hundreds if not thousands of dollars are deposited as payment for their produce.

TGPA marketing director Rebecca Gambiza testified that many families were turning their backyards into garlic, ginger or turmeric fields. We hope more will harken to the possibilities presented by these new crops and help grow Zimbabwe’s wealth.

The three crops can be value-added into cereals, teas, powders and hot drinks processed here and exported to Europe, Asia, the United States of America and other markets where they are in demand.

Such projects can also leverage Zimbabwe as it participates in the recently launched Africa Free Trade Area. More foreign currency earned leaves the country in better stead to import necessities such as fuel and electricity while empowering the country to meet its debt obligations.

This is transformational agriculture and AFC would not have come at a better time. As stated last week, more user-friendly financing facilities for agriculture, and the rest of the back-up support resident in AFC can only yield great results for this economy.

Many are optimistic that at this stage the country’s economy can only go forward. They have thrown away the reverse gear.

Annual inflation, which slowed to 194 percent in April, is expected to ease to 55 percent by July. This is surely something to write home about. A stable macro-economic environment is critical for agriculture and other sectors of the economy to flourish.

Local and international economists and commentators are almost tripping over each other in their numbers as they marvel at developments in the economy. This creates confidence, the energiser required for the economy to sustain the growth trajectory it has assumed.

The feedback has been encouraging.

While we had expressed great optimism on the impact of the new AFC, we had no idea that this would elicit such levels of excitement and great optimism as registered during ensuing discussions with Mr Nyabadza and other experts in the sector.

Below are some of the thoughts and exchanges that came out of discussions.

Agriculture marathon to vision 2030

“To drive our Agricultural agenda towards Vision 2030, we need to eliminate the following anomalies:

• Export of bread
• Export of mealie meal
• Export of milk
• Export of beef/ poultry products from one province to the other

To highlight the above Scenario the following example is a reality today. Bread consumed in Bulawayo is produced in Marondera/ Harare, then transported day/night to Bulawayo and beyond. Consumption of fuel takes place including wear and tear of vehicles. The bread consumed in Dombotombo township (Marondera) carries the same price as a loaf of bread consumed in Luveve Township (Bulawayo) 800km to and from. The following questions arise, who is paying for this cost, is it necessary, the amount of fuel consumed on a daily basis, diesel is imported into our economy. The technology of ovens/ baking bread is well developed within our economy. How much waste is incurred on a daily, weekly, monthly, annual basis? Why is it that the companies manufacturing bread are not setting up in Bulawayo, Masvingo, Mutare and Gweru? The big question is, do these companies make more money in transporting bread than baking?

Business Intelligence will expose the ills trapped in this scenario.

The above analysis is applicable to mealie meal, milk, beef/ poultry products. The resultant effect is that the Zimbabwean farmer is denied extra revenue due to unnecessary movement of value leading to poor capitalisation on their respective farms. This is why Zimbabwe farming community welcomes the birth of Agriculture Finance Corporation (AFC) with its respective units. The coming on board of AFC will expose the lack of business intelligence settled within our food sector. In fact, this issue goes back to our education system inherited from the federation days.  We welcome education 5.0

Business Intelligence will expose the anomalies settled within our food industry. The number of cartels operating within the food industry will be exposed by an active business intelligence analysis unit. Let’s give examples to illustrate our observations; Mashonaland West Province returns the biggest grain silos units within our economy and yet she does not have a well-established milling facility. In other words, bulk of her cereals are exported to other provinces for milling/ processing. Mash west should be the net exporter of maize/mealie meal to other provinces. In other words, we expect Mat South to import maize from Mash West for milling in her own province thereby creating employment to her citizenry under milling.

The above scenario will ensure additional money going to the farmer than the transporter.

There is no justification to the current trend where maize from Karoi is transported to Harare for milling and transport the mealie meal to Kariba district for consumption. In such a scenario, the Zimbabwean farmer is not paid what is due to him instead transporters are having a field day in moving value unnecessarily in the process wasting imported fuel.

The following industries milling, bakery, abattoir, dairy and poultry are a must in each province. Yesterday we found it necessary to decentralise our education/ health institutions.

Today we speak of provincial hospitals/ universities, under the devolution agenda, guided by business intelligence each province must have a target to meet the above.

This is where AFC rebirth will be felt, provision of finance to restructure our food sector under the second republic. The contribution of rural agriculture must take off due to the coming on board of AFC. The development of villages underpinned by water; solar development infrastructure will grow District GDP thereby running the marathon to Vision 2030.

In summary we challenge our higher learning institutions to put together a degree course in Business Intelligence under respective sectors,” read the summary of discussions.

In God I Trust!

◆ Twitter handle: @VictoriaRuzvid2; Email: [email protected]; [email protected]; WhatsApp number: 0772 129 992.