By John P. Maketo
My family part of Maketo-Chokuwa clan migrated from Zimuto in Masvingo. The migration was influenced by a combination of push and pull factors, mainly the search for fertile soils and farming land. I was born and grew up in Gokwe South, Nyamhunga village under Headman Ngomeni in Chief Sai area, an agro-ecological region 3 & 4 area with low annual rainfall amounts and incessant seasonal droughts. Cotton farming became the main economic activity, not because of choice but by default as the climate is not conducive for other cash crops. As early as Grade 1, I became engrossed in the 10-months cotton far2ming cycle. The labour started with tilling the land, planting, weeding, cultivating, multiple spraying, picking, baling, selling and finally residue clearing. I will briefly detail experiences on each of the farming stages. Land Tilling –this was an arduous or laborious process starting in the dry season periods around August/September as dry tilling. The muddy clay soils favourable for cotton farming become sticky once the rains fall, so the best time is before the rains. Dry tilling is not an easy task using an ox-drawn ploughs. To beat the sun heat, my father would wake me up around 2 am to go into the fields and ‘work’ would continue up to until about 6.30 am during school days and up to 8.30 am during holidays. During school days, it was routine to go into the fields first before going to school at any stage of the cotton farming cycle. In one of the fateful nights, tired and sleep walking while in front of the cattle, I was awakened by a sharp horn thrust into my left ribs. The scar remains visible to this day. One of my uncles decided to awaken me by heating the cattle with a shambok. In turn the beast extended the pressure to a 6-year old walking in front of it. Weeding – Weeding starts as early as 2-3 weeks after germination and is repeated until the crop has outgrown any weeds. To get a good grade, the cotton must be harvested in a clean field. Growing up in the late 1980s and 1990s, the use of herbicides was not popular. In fact, I would confidently say it was an unknown agricultural practice in my area. If there were any that knew about herbicides, they probably could not afford to buy them. Best known to us was weeding with hand hoes (kusakura nebadza). Cotton is labour intensive, a few could afford hired labour (maricho) and many relied on free family labour. As mentioned earlier, child labour was and I suspect still is a key enabler in cotton farming. A good number of my age-mates dropped out of school or repeated severally in order to provide cotton farming labour. This was more so the case for girls. ‘Famous’ cotton producers in the area were families with several children (free labour). The more the children and wives one had, the better one was able to produce a larger harvest thereby a motivation to marry many wives and bear more children. In the mornings, standard 4-lines were pegged for each of us in the family before going to school. We were deprived of rest and normal school life as other children in other parts of the country, only for a promise of Christmas goodies after harvest, and often this never came through. Cultivating Spraying -cotton is prone to pests and diseases at different growth stages. From as early as three weeks after germination, pests such as aphids begin to attack the crop until splitting of the cotton balls. And the spraying journey begins and is repeated for 5 to 6 times. The labour involved fetching water from straining distances and the actual spraying using a 16 litre or 20 litre knapsack sprayer. I suspect my sustained back-ache started during these childhood days of farming labour. With no awareness of chemical handling, the exposure to chemicals was damaging. I recall several sleepless night due to skin itching after exposure to chemicals like Karate, Rogor. Some of the chronic effects of regular exposure to Rogor are headaches, dizziness, nausea, stomach cramps, sweating and diarrhoea. The effect is determined by how you have been exposed to the chemical. Cotton picking started as soon as the crop balls started to whiten. More and more bending of the back will follow as picking is repeated up to 3 times or more until the field is clear. Collective labour initiatives like “humwe” would save the day for young people in the area an opportunity to socialize while at work. Baling-after picking, packing the cotton in bales would be another task in waiting. At some point I remained the only ‘man’ at home with my grandmother and aunties. Kutsika bhero was clearly cut out for me and again, its labour intensive. The idea of earning much weight in every bale and supposed higher revenue engrossed people to pounds on their bales and use all sorts of tricks like watering. Selling– our nearest selling point was Manoti growth point (approximately 25 km away). It is a 6 hour journey using an ox-drawn cart. The queues at the depot would be stretching hundreds of metres already on arrival. Sometimes we could return home a day after or very late at night. In the late 1980’s to 1990’s, the then Cotton Marketing Board (CMB), now rebranded to Cotton Company of Zimbabwe (COTCO) would send farmers cheques via Post Office school private bags two months after selling of the crop. The payment waiting period was agonising, households got into debts in anticipation of uncertain pay-out amounts that often disappointed and also gave rise to domestic violence. COTCO enjoyed the monopoly and exploited thousands of rural small holder cotton farmers. The coming in of a competitor in the name of Cargill with its popular ‘cash ipapo ipapo’ changed the practice and injustice of delayed payments by CMB. Nevertheless, producer prices remained largely unfair and tilted to favour cotton merchants and processors. To secure a threshold of producers, and lure farmers from going to the new player in the industry, Cargill (popularly referred as mainini then), COTTCO (maiguru) began to contract farmers and giving them inputs like seeds, fertilizer and chemicals. A process known as contract farming which creates a dependency syndrome and entrenched farmers into a vicious cycle of debt-trap. Due to poverty induced by low producer prices condemning farmers to perennial borrowers, COTTCO retained a significant threshold of farmers that remained ‘loyal’ and supplying the white gold to the company. Unbeknown to farmers was the fact that inputs were unfairly priced above market average and all amounts owing were deducted at source such that whatever remains for the farmer was never sufficient to buy inputs for the next season. As a result, many remained bound to contract farming. Clearing –you would almost think the labour is over, but around July/August, the remains of the bushy cotton crop remain an eye sore in the fields and in preparation for the next planting season this residue has to be cut down one by one with a hoe put on fire. This is my journey in cotton farming, and that of many ‘Gokwerians’ and other cotton producing communal areas in Zimbabwe. Tonnes and tonnes of cotton have been produced from Gokwe over the years yet livelihoods remain unchanged. I have witnessed people sinking into poverty year after year. Meanwhile, cotton companies have flourished, secured assets and investments at the expense of the hard-working poor. Some facts about cotton trade in Zimbabwe: cotton farming in the dry regions of the country has been a significant response to adverse effects of low rainfall and climate change. Cotton, the second most important cash crop in Zimbabwe (after tobacco), is grown on average plot sizes of about one hectare in the summer rainfall growing season (November to April). Cotton is grown in four main regions of the country that are hot and receive rainfall of between 400 mm and 600 mm per annum. The central and north-western parts of the country in the Midlands province covering areas in Gokwe South and North, are where the bulk of cotton production takes place. The northern part of the country in parts of the Mashonaland Central province around Muzarabani, Mahuwe, and Mushumbi. The south-eastern part of the country is in the Lowveld, Manicaland and Masvingo provinces covering areas around Checheche, Mwenezi and Chiredzi and Binga in the Zambezi Valley of the Matabeleland North province. Over 200,000 small scale farmers–with an average family size of 6-10 people (at least 1.2 million people) are mainly dependant on cotton production for their basic subsistence in Zimbabwe. Small-scale farmers account for 95 percent of the cotton output. The farmers are not heavily mechanized and depend on rainfall to produce the crop. Zimbabwe produces an average of 300 million kilogrammes of high quality cotton lint annually of which 70-80% is exported. Zimbabwe is earning an average of 109 million per year between 2010 and 2021, and in 2022 the country pocketed US$ 88 million from cotton export. Domestic consumption of cotton lint by spinners is low and the bulk of cotton lint is exported to South Africa, Mozambique, Zambia. Child labour is rife in cotton production. Contract farming has created a dependency syndrome that facilitates the exploitation of cotton farmers by cotton companies. Over time, I have always pondered on these critical questions: While cotton is an undisputed significant foreign currency earner for the country, like tobacco, cotton farming regions are also consistent in marking some of the poorest, neglected and least developed regions of the country. Years of toil in cotton fields have not changed standards of living for the farming communities. Is this a policy design or strategy? Is government blind to the fact? Or is business thriving under the conditions? Why is it impossible or difficult to also remunerate (fully or partially) cotton farmers in foreign currency denomination as is the case with other producers of export products like tobacco and gold? In the life of the 9th Parliament, combined Gokwe South and Gokwe North, had 9 representatives in the House of Assembly and 2 representatives in the Senate. In the past five years, none of the 11 representatives voiced concern over trade injustices in the cotton production and marketing value chain. Some of these hold cabinet positions or are in high ranks of the ruling Zanu PF party – Hon, Paul Mavhima, Hon Owen Ncube, Ambassador Victor Matemadanda key among these. Other former cabinet ministers include Flora Bhuka and Jason Machaya. What baffles one’s mind is whether the underdevelopment of Gokwe is a leadership failure and lack of representation or market driven strategy to exploit millions of lives for profit gains? Or is it a combination of both–the political economy of under development? With the reality of climate change dawning on us – why has the government of Zimbabwe not shifted focus to strategically support drought tolerant crops in dryer regions of the country like Gokwe and encouraging cotton production through rewarding producer prices? The emphasis of corporate accountability and corporate social responsibility placed on mining companies–is it by design that cotton extracting companies have been spared from this requirement? Similar standards set for marketing and selling of minerals like diamond – Kimberly certification process, should be applicable to cotton marketing. Cotton contracting companies should be seen to be promoting among other things – fair labour practices, fair market practices including competition, environmental protection and sustainable local economic development. Child labour is rampant practice in Gokwe. Many children particularly school going age girls have lost education opportunities to support family cotton production ambitions with little to no remuneration. The road network is appalling and in deplorable conditions and many areas inaccessible during the rainy season. Schools infrastructure also leaves a lot to be desired and travelling distances remain very straining for conducive learning conditions. Same applies to primary health care institutions with only one referral hospital serving a population of over 350,000 people in the district. Agriculture is an extractive industry, pressure groups such as Publish What You Pay Coalition (PWYP) should also focus on industry players to see their contributions and lack thereof to local economic development. Cotton production deserves better policy attention than it gets now. The production of the crop remains an area of interest for booth government, private sector players, civil society and cotton growing communities. It remains largely debatable that, current government interventions have made the vulnerable cotton farmers improve their livelihoods under adverse climate conditions. The emancipation dream attached to the rich white gold that influence migration decisions of many households, communities and even chiefdoms from places such as Masvingo (Chief Jiri), Shurugwi, Chirumhanzu, Zimuto, Chivi among other places in the early to mid-60s remains elusive. For many in Gokwe, it remains a ‘resource curse’ scenario. So rich, yet so poor!
John P. Maketo is the Programmes Manager, Zimbabwe Coalition on Debt and Development (ZIMCODD) and Acting Fight Inequality
Alliance Zimbabwe Coordinator and writes in his personal capacity. John is a Public Debt Management & Economic Justice analyst and can be contacted on email: jo*********@fi*************.org or jp******@gm***.com
