The Sunday News
FARMERS in Matobo, Matabeleland South province are in the process of setting up a farm produce processing centre to preserve and value-add their produce as a way of empowering themselves.
In an interview during the tour of the processing centre last week, named Sekuthe Dlwe, the centre’s treasurer, Mr Nkosilathi Mabuza, said in 2011, they decided to construct the processing centre after getting funds from Liechtenstein Development Service (Led) whose fund is being administered by a local non- governmental organisation (NGO), Pro Africa.
Mr Mabuza said they are going to use the centre to preserve their seasonal agricultural produce and also sell excess.
“We are about 86 farmers who are running an irrigation scheme here in Matobo and we discovered that when we harvest our produce, it goes bad and we were making a lot of losses. We were then approached by Pro Africa who are giving us the material to build the processing centre,” said Mr Mabuza.
A local councillor and stakeholder in the project, Mrs Sikhulile Hlongwane, said the processing centre, which is the first of its kind in the area, was going to reduce wastage.
“We discovered there was a need to add value to our agricultural products and ensure that it does not get bad. We are processing a variety of food stuffs such as vegetables, fruits, peanut butter, fish and herbs,” said Mrs Hlongwane.
Experts say post-harvest losses and the lack of basic processing technologies plague the food industry in developing countries.
Mrs Hlongwane said initially the processing centre was a beer hall owned by the local authority before they were allowed to operate there.
Another councillor and stakeholder in the life changing project, Clr Thomas Ncube, said the processing centre was not yet fully operational due to lack of water.
“What we need to do now is to connect water to the processing centre so that we can start processing the food stuffs,” he said.
Pro Africa capacity building co-ordinator, Mrs Juliet Bethule, said the farmers were going to market their produce through various means such as the internet and be able to reach out to many customers across the globe.
The association is also in the process of building a conference centre to train farmers on how to preserve food.
