Back off conservancies, Govt warns
Wednesday, 15 February 2012 00:00
Herald Reporter
GOVERNMENT does not support the allocation of land to people in areas reserved for conservancies, a senior official has said.
He said this had resulted in newly resettled farmers facing challenges in these areas. Appearing before the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Natural Resources, Environment and Tourism on Tuesday, Lands and Rural Resettlement secretary, Mrs Sophia Tsvakwi, said resettlement fell under three ministries.
“The Ministry of Local Government is responsible for allocating A1 farms, the Ministry of Lands allocates A2 farms while the Ministry of Environment is responsible for allocating conservancies,” she said.
“We are in harmony for other areas except for conservancies. When people were allocated land in conservancies we were not involved.”
Mrs Tsvakwi said Gonarezhou National Park was one of the affected areas.
Government was currently consulting to come up with a policy on resettling people in areas reserved for tree plantations.
Legislators had raised concern with the way some newly resettled farmers in plantation areas destroyed plantations for crop production.
She said Government will resettle people after the consultations for a new policy have been completed.