SMALLHOLDER farmers will be smiling all the way to the bank in the Midlands Province after improving their combined yields by over 100 000 tonnes through the Intwasa/Pfumvudza programme.

In the 2019/2020 summer cropping season, smallholder farmers in the province produced a mere 21 700 tonnes of maize from their plots.

A combination of good rains and the climate-proofed concept (Intwasa/Pfumvudza) saw production by smallholder farmers in the 2020/2021 season shooting up five times to 122 000 tonnes.

Small grains such as sorghum went up to 15 201 tonnes up from 11 000 tonnes in the 2019/2020 season.

Smallholder farmers such as Mr Praymore Ndlela from Zvishavane and Mrs Ruth Gara from Shurugwi are part of thousands of farmers from the province’s eight districts who embraced the concept.

Mrs Gara said when Government introduced the Intwasa/Pfumvudza concept, she just thought of trying her luck.

In Shurugwi, the community, including her husband, is mostly preoccupied with mining and her decision to embrace Intwasa has paid off.

Mrs Gara said she had been planning to venture into farming for some time.
From her magic hand in farming, Mrs Gara harvested about 12 tonnes of maize per hectare at her 8 hectare piece of land.

“For the greater part of my time, I have been working with my husband at his mine and the hospitality business but decided to venture into farming. I embraced the Intwasa/ Pfumvudza programme and now I am seeing value in farming and I intend to extend the hectares under the programme this year,” she said.

Mrs Gara said she has also taken advantage of the available water which was being pumped out of the family mine to introduce irrigation at their plot.

“The plot is near our mine so for some years, my husband has been using heavy duty pumps to pump out water from the mine and all the water has been going to waste. So, we had three hectares under irrigation while five were under rain fed and it did well.

“We are continuing with Intwasa/ Pfumvudza under irrigation and it’s going to be an all-year-round crop,” she said.
The new farming concept was introduced early last year to maximise production per unit area, even during drought periods to ensure household and national food security which has since been achieved.

Mr Ndlela from Buchwa Mine in Zvishavane said he managed to get 10 tonnes per hectare from his small fields dotted in and around the mine.

He said he had to hire some fields from other Buchwa Mine residents, who were not keen on farming.

“After the introduction of Intwasa/Pfumvudza, I registered and am one of the farmers from this area who was keen on participating in the programme.

“With my family we had only three hectares only but we decided to hire more fields of different sizes from fellow people in and around Buchwa Mine and it has paid dividends,” he said.

Mr Ndlela said most areas in Zvishavane were hard hit by drought but because of Intwasa/Pfumvudza, he managed to score big.

“This Government driven concept works and I wish all smallholder farmers embrace it for increased yields,” he said.
Mr Ndlela said he has since delivered five tonnes to the Grain Marketing Board (GMB) and is now looking for more land after a successful season.

“It is my wish that I get at least 15 hectares and that way I know with the Intwasa/Pfumvudza programme I will deliver more to GMB,” he said.

In an interview yesterday, Midlands Provincial Agronomist Mr Innocent Dzuke said the Intwasa/ Pfumvudza programme had seen a surge in maize production in the province.

“Maize production in the Midlands province under Intwasa/Pfumvudza was 122 671 tonnes up from 21 700 tonnes during the 2019/2020 summer cropping season.

‘‘You can see that the Intwasa/Pfumvudza programme saw a huge increase in maize production this year as compared to 2019/2020 when it was not there and so basically the increase in maize production is attributed to the programme,” he said.

“So there was also an increase in small grains to 15 201 tonnes up from 11 000 tonnesafter the introduction of the Intwasa/ Pfumvudza programme. Wheat we have not yet harvested but we are projecting higher yields,” he said.

According to the Zimbabwe Vulnerability Assessment Committee (ZimVAC), latest about 79 percent of households in the Midlands Province were familiar with the Intwasa/Pfumvudza programme of which 63 percent had received training and 59 percent had practiced it.

“Chirumhanzu District (84 percent) had the highest proportion of households which practiced Intwasa/Pfumvudza while Gokwe South (37 percent) had the lowest,” reads part of the report.

The Intwasa programme promotes conservation farming techniques and involves use of small plots by smallholder farmers and applying the correct agronomic practices for higher returns.