By Virginia Njovo
Masvingo district’s Zvinyaningwe Community Garden recently got support to develop their 2-hectares garden into a fully-fledged irrigation scheme from the United Nations Development Partner (UNDP) in collaboration with the Green Climate Fund (GCF).
Established in 2013, the garden project involves ninety households, including Muzhwi Primary School and draws water from Muzhwi Dam.
Speaking to TellZim News, Zvinyaningwe Irrigation Scheme Chairperson Tafirenyika Mazivisa said it took them time to be recognized and get help to develop from the small portion which they were farming in their own capacity.
“Our project started in June 2013 when we were operating at a small scale in our own capacity and later got registered as a cooperation in June 2016. Fortunately we got our partner in 2021 and we are starting to realise our vision of having an irrigation scheme to sustain ourselves and our families,” said Mazivisa.
Mazivisa said they had tried their best to include women and youth as well.
“Our scheme has 48 women, 14 men, 26 youth, 14 of which are female and 12 are male. This shows the future of our irrigation is bright since there is young blood which will continue with the operations,” said Mazivisa.
The community has managed to clear 46ha needed as well as fencing 2700 meters of the scheme while waiting for their donor to provide funding for the remaining meters while calling for those able to finance the remaining work to chip in.
A beneficiary from the scheme, Christine Mavhika indicated that due to ignorance on climatic conditions farmers were suffering from drought since they had little knowledge on climate change as well as how they were supposed to adapt to these changes.
“We were not aware of climate change, we were only following the seasons which we knew from long back not knowing it is already among us and we suffered from drought year after year as we only had a small portion which we were irrigating. We are grateful for the intervention of UNDP and GCF for sharing climate change knowledge as well as assisting us in implementing mitigatory strategies,” said Mavhika.
Ward 4 Agritex Officer, Vonai Hove said she was working with GCF, UNDP and the government in educating farmers on how to create seasonal calendars which they should use when they start farming as well as resource allocation.
“We are in region four where rainfall patterns are not regular. I will be teaching farmers on crop rotation when receiving normal rainfall, below normal rainfall as well as above normal rainfall so they know which calendar they must use,” said Hove.
UNDP provided funding to purchase a floating pontoon (pump), 4.6km main conveyance pipe, 46ha sprinkle system, fencing among other things.
The scheme currently has a chilli nursery and is expected to plant soon after the completion of fencing.
Zimbabwe has over 10 000 inland water bodies and Masvingo province owns 60 percent of them yet it is one of the provinces most affected by drought.
