Cde Zhanda

Marvelous Moyo Gwanda Correspondent
THE government has dispatched a team to assess the impact of drought on livestock in Matabeleland South province with a view to come up with intervention strategies.The delegation, led by Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development Deputy Minister responsible for livestock, Cde Paddy Zhanda, yesterday visited the Minister of State for Matabeleland South Province Cde Abedinico Ncube where they were briefed about the livestock and crop situation in the province.

Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) representatives accompanied the deputy minister on his tour of Gwanda District.

In an interview soon after the meeting, Cde Zhanda said government sought to put in place possible intervention measures to save livestock.

He said they wanted to avoid a recurrence of the 2012 calamity when the province lost more than 9,000 cattle due to drought.

“The reason why I’m here is to make sure that I’ve all the information so that I can take it to the authorities. I’m accompanied by the FAO representatives who assisted us in 2012. This will make it easy for government if it wants to put a position forward to FAO. It will be easier because FAO are in the know and on the ground. FAO can then act on our requests with ease in ensuring mitigation is put in place before disaster strikes,” said Cde Zhanda.

The province had in the past months been hit by a dry spell which resulted in most crops wilting while pastures were also deteriorating.

However, most parts of the country have in the past few days received some rains which Cde Zhanda said were insignificant.

“Yes, the situation at the moment is a bit distorted because of the rains received recently but I can assure you that these rains will not bring much change to the outlook of the province,” he said.

The delegation toured various wards meeting farmers and listening to their grievances.

They also assessed water sources availability.

Cde Zhanda said his ministry was concerned with the long distances travelled by some livestock to water points as it impacted negatively on their condition.

“We also want to make sure that cattle do not move long distances in search of water because that’s how diseases are transmitted. We want to avoid that because in Insiza District, we already have some pockets of outbreaks of Foot-and-Mouth. This poses a lot of danger to livestock if we allow cattle to move for long distances,” he said.

Cde Zhanda said farmers needed to understand the need to destock in times of drought and buy stock feed to save other animals.

“We also want to persuade our farmers especially when disaster is looming to take stock of their animals and destock.  In persuading farmers to destock, we need to create a market for them. We need to make sure that they are not shortchanged by private abattoirs or anyone buying cattle taking advantage of farmers that need to destock,” he said.