The Sunday News
FOLLOWING last week’s article on cattle levies and my suggestion that local authorities should do more than just collecting the levies, I got a request from a senior government official in Lupane District to look at how the issue of cattle sales could be
organised in a manner that is beneficial to the three parties involved, that is the farmer, the buyer and the local authority. This week’s article will therefore try to share my opinion on what can be done in this critical economic driver of the southern part of the country.
In my view, the livestock industry has two major sections namely the production and the marketing side.
Local authorities need to take an active role in both the production and marketing side. This is not to say the local authorities should usurp powers of the line ministries that are involved in livestock development but they should co-ordinate the activities as well as provide a conducive environment for implementation of livestock production activities.
This should not be difficult because these line ministries sit in the rural district development committee (RDDC) and they can be monitored and supervised at that level.
The local authority for example should have within its plans, development initiatives that promote livestock production.
It should be in the strategic plans and annual programmes how the local authority will facilitate provision of production infrastructure for livestock development.
It is definitely an insult to the country and surely unacceptable that almost all if not all dip tanks were built during the Rhodesian era and are at advanced state of dilapidation and are overwhelmed by the existing livestock population. Some of the dip tanks are death traps for the animals while local authorities fold hands and wait at the marketing end of the value chain. Repairing dip tanks cannot be left to non-governmental organisations.
In the same vein in relation to production infrastructure, local authorities should strive to provide critical facilities such as drinking points. Water is a very critical component especially in the marginal agro-ecological regions 4 and 5.
These areas do not have perennial rivers and the dams are far apart. Some of the dams also dry up due to siltation or poor recharging as a result of low precipitation.
In this regard it is therefore imperative and instructive that deliberate efforts should be made to provide water for animals.
This can be done through drilling boreholes and use of old age technology such as windmills to provide water in the grazing areas.
Local authorities host the district water and sanitation subcommittee (DWSCC). The committee comprises a number of government departments and non-governmental organisations with a focus towards provision of water and sanitation.
Why can’t the DWSCC mandate be expanded to include provision of water for livestock?
Boreholes should be drilled in grazing areas and sand abstraction equipment installed along big rivers so as to harness water for livestock.
This may sound theoretical and even naïve to the uninitiated but it is painful to see old people digging pits of up to seven metres on riverbeds of such rivers as Shangani, Thekwani, Maitengwe and Tuli just to mention a few, so as to water their animals.
These rivers are also far apart and in some areas animals have to trek for about 15 kilometres to the riverbed against a background of almost zero pastures. This is a critical area of which if the local authorities step in and take a leading role in provision of water instead of waiting for a dead district development fund (DDF), farmers may begin to notice and appreciate the use of cattle-related levies.
On the marketing side farmers only want two things, namely a fair price and regular cattle sales. However this usually does not happen as the price offered is at times lower than what farmers get when they sell among themselves.
At times the sales are not only poor in price but very erratic such that farmers do not know when they will sell again.
Again the local authority can do better here, for example why not have your own auctioneer who is a council employee and therefore can uphold the expectations of council. Most local authorities have agriculture and natural resources officers whose mandate can be easily extended to organising and conducting livestock auctions. Livestock sales do not just happen, there is serious organising that goes into it such as advertising for buyers and mobilising for animals.
The latter is also very important as buyers do not want to drive several kilometres just to find five animals on sale.
It’s simply uneconomic and time wasting. There has to be an assurance that there is a sizeable head on sale worthy the buyers’ time.
Like I indicated in our last week article, an auction should have more than one buyer so as to stimulate competitive bidding.
In short local authorities should participate on both the production side and the marketing side of livestock so that they begin to be seen to reap where they sow.
Feedback [email protected] or cell 0772851275.
