The Sunday News
Farming Reporter
THE Department of Agricultural Technical and Extension Services has urged farmers to sow early maturing seed maize varieties and to embark on crop diversification so as to enable them to obtain a sustainable yield in the event of erratic rains.
Matabeleland region’s provincial Agritex officers said due to the delay in rains in their areas of jurisdiction this season farmers should ensure that they crop early maturing varieties to guard against having their crops wilting before maturing as the rainy season was unpredictable.
“We are urging farmers to crop very early maturing maize varieties as well as putting small grains such as sorghum, millet, rapoko and even include crops such as beans and cow peas.
“Since the rains are unpredictable there is a need for farmers to engage in crop diversification so as to spread the risk in the event that the other crop doesn’t do well,” said Matabeleland North provincial Agritex officer, Mr Dumisani Nyoni.
Matabeleland South provincial Agritex officer, Mr Judiya Ncube, concurred with Mr Nyoni’s sentiment and said that farmers should weed on time to avoid their crops competing for nutrients with weeds.
“At this time it is advisable for farmers to crop small grains and even beans. They should, however, refrain from cropping groundnuts as they take a long time to mature.
“There is also a need for farmers to ensure that they weed their fields in time to avoid the weeds competing for nutrients with the crops,” Mr Ncube said.
In much of semi-arid lower potential parts of Zimbabwe, there is a serious risk of unreliable rainfall, and late-season drought. In these areas, farmers have been urged to plant early-maturing varieties and depending on the rainfall pattern, two crops may be grown per year.
