The Sunday News
Nkosilathi Sibanda, Features Correspondent
NOW that the summer planting season has set in, any farmer worth their salt knows no sleep. The land has to be turned and seed sown.
In the morning, women farmers in the city make a bee line to their little plots. One of them is Mrs Komborero Mhaka, a peri-urban farmer whose Klilo Enterprise farm is a model of success in an era where smallholder farmers are seen as the panacea to food shortages and aversion of hunger in general.
Hers is not a story of achievement on a silver platter. It reads of sacrifice, loss and tribulation. Before she became a farmer of repute she was living large in the city. She enjoyed the good life, yet at the back of her mind she wanted to farm.
City life makes it hard for a woman to commit to farming. Few make it. Mrs Mhaka had to take a leap of faith. She left her dream city house to live in the countryside. For her, the journey to become one of the country’s enterprising farmers was not smooth. It was much of a risk. She loved her house in the leafy suburbs of Bulawayo and also yearned to own a farm. But she had to choose one.
Now settled at her Klilo Enterprises farm in Douglasdale in Umguza one of the prime farming areas of Matabeleland North Province just a stone’s throw distance off the city, the farmer prides herself in having made a life changing decision. It was the biggest sacrifice ever.
Starting small, Mrs Mhaka has grown in leaps and bounds to be one of the biggest and most sought-after suppliers of horticultural produce to reputable supermarket chains in Bulawayo. She admits, the first days were hard.
“I started farming four years ago. It was a hard decision that my husband and I had to take. We had to convince our children that it was the best. Abandoning the posh city life for the dirt and toil of farmland was one of a sacrifice. It had to be done,” said Mrs Mhaka.
By the time most people wake up and prepare for the day, Mrs Mhaka’s thumb and index fingers would be throbbing. Tilling her land, packaging farm produce for the market and counting money from the sales, is what makes the day for the enterprising farmer. Her hands know dirt and money pretty well. On a good day, Mrs Mhaka makes money that white-collar workers can not get in a month.
Typical of every farmer, she works her land under the scorching sun. Before the day ends, she has to pick her best produce that is ready for the market’s next day sale.
Out of her plot, Mrs Mhaka practices diversified farming. She plants cabbages, tomatoes, pepper, butternuts, English cucumbers, beetroot, carrots and chomoulier. Road runner breeds of Black Australop, Bouchveld and the Cuckoo chickens are the latest addition to her farm enterprise.
Of all the produce, Mrs Mhaka prides herself in the lettuce vegetable. The whole of Bulawayo’s vegetable market knows her as the best at growing lettuce. She sells the lettuce and some horticultural produce to big chain supermarkets, restaurants and hotels. The money is good, she says.
She loathes planting maize. There is more money from lettuce, green beans, tomatoes and cucumbers.
She has planted the ‘fancy lettuce’ that is on demand in upmarket hotels.
“There is more money in horticultural produce than in maize. All one needs is to do the farming well and have a market,” said Mrs Mhaka in an interview at her farm.
“I like to plant crops that mature in the shortest period and be able to sell as fast too. I do crop rotation on a small space and plant varieties. It makes business easy.”
Mrs Mhaka is not shy to explain that farming is a business. She calls herself an entrepreneur and takes pride in advising women to venture into farming. In Zimbabwe, 70 percent of farmers are women, according to the Ministry of Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement.
Owning the means of production at the farm, sets out Mrs Mhaka as an example of how agriculture can be a vehicle to women empowerment and support of the Small to Medium Enterprises. At the farm, a greenhouse stands. There, her English cucumber plant grows, in what she explains as an investment that will bring fortunes to the farm. Her vegetables are watered using the drip irrigation system.
“With this green house, one will never go wrong with farming. I prefer the green house for its ability to extend my crop or vegetable growing season. Most obviously, the facility offers weather protection. I have more choices on what to plant in any season.”
Innovation and experimentation seem to be the hallmark at the farm. A few metres from the greenhouse is a solar powered borehole and a rising water tank. Working on the enabling slope, water is pumped to supply water to the diversified gardens of green pepper, lettuce, and butternut crop.
Mrs Mhaka said she was well aware of the need to use technology in the farm. Climate change that brought in unpredictable and unreliable weather patterns has not spared the peri-urban farmer.
“Water availability is important. We have to erect a borehole that is solar powered so that we do not run the risk of failing to wet our crops when electricity is cut. Most importantly farming nowadays is all about making best use of the available technology,” she said.
But, even if she has a good water storage facility, the water has not been enough at times. Of late the borehole could not pump plenty. Experts told her the water table was low-an effect of climate change.
Nothing goes to waste at the farm. The cabbage plant did not do well due to water challenges that are constant at most farms in Umguza. The crop residues are fed to chickens in what is a sustainability move as the farm does not lose anything.
“The chickens love to eat greens. So, whenever we have extra or when the crop has failed, we simply give it to the birds. In that way we make sure that we save on chicken feed and it has proven to be a nutritional supplement,” said Mrs Mhaka.
She also makes dried vegetables, known as umfutshwa, from the cabbage leaves. Umfutshwa is delicacy in many homes and a 100gramme pack can fetch up to US$1 at the market.
“If I do not give dried vegetables to my extended family in Mberengwa, I sell them. They are in demand now that people are aware of eating healthy foods.”
Her dream is to rear over 4 000 chickens in the coming year. Although Mrs Mhaka is the hands-on director at Klilo Enterprises farm, her husband Tinomuvonga chips in with the funding. Having been born and bred in the farmlands of Mberengwa, both knew the value that agriculture has in sustaining livelihoods.
“Farming is a key sector in the economy and in particular in meeting household food security. I grew up in a farming community where subsistence farming was the main activity. I learned the basics from a young age. After a thought, my wife and I saw it as the best enterprise to embark on,” said Mr Mhaka.
Mr Mhaka helped his wife build the farm business through paltry salary savings. He recalls that their children were hesitant to leave the city but now they conceded after seeing the financial gains from the farm.
“We had to forgo luxuries. Our kids are enjoying and grateful that we made the decision to be farmers.”
Mr Mhaka implored other farmers to take agriculture seriously as there is more to derive from farming. He denounced the culture of “cell phone” farming where lazy farmers choose to settle in the city.
“This is a hands-on business. Farming is not difficult, it needs commitment.” Mrs Mhaka’s dance with farming is a tale of a woman who has toiled to cultivate her land under challenging situations where she defied all odds to come up with substantial produce in each harvest.
The World Banks says in the past decade, 40 percent of Africa’s peri-urban lands are fast turning into lucrative farm businesses done by small to medium enterprises. The bulk of farm enterprises are into producing eggs, fruit or milk, but the majority farm vegetables. Her enterprise counts as a buffer against seasonal shortages or food price hikes that have hit the country of late.
As many families in the city and surroundings survive on the affordable produce from her farm. Mrs Mhaka said she never went to an agriculture school but relies much on knowledge from her massive social capital networks and relationships in the farming community.
This has been the case with emerging peri-urban farmers. They outsource information through social media platforms. The farmers share produce with those around them, and then draw on these relationships when they need labour, food items or favours.
The social benefits of peri-urban agriculture, as the 2017 World Bank report on agriculture puts it, help the poor bounce back from economic shocks like drought, retrenchment or illness. Mrs Mhaka’s horticulture produce is also sold to schools and churches. She gives some surplus to the poor communities in Douglasdale and nearby communities. Although women like Mrs Mhaka contribute more to the country’s agricultural sector, very few own farms, making it impossible for them to embark on commercial farming. Mrs Mhaka would want that corrected as she is on a quest to get into big scale commercial farming.
“I want to get more land and do farming on a large scale. If women farmers are given access to land, this country will never be short of food. Emphasis should be on land ownership and financial support. In the near future, my plans are on expanding the chicken business and getting a bigger space to plant horticultures varieties. If I am successful on a small plot, I will definitely make it with a bigger farm,” she said.
Her move from the suburbs ought to be an inspiration to any woman who has lived to bear the brunt poverty in the city. Mrs Mhaka makes a good living selling vegetables. She said she can afford to pay her workers on time and settle her bills without a problem.
“The business of horticulture is lucrative. This is my biggest message to fellow women. Take the farm as a business and everything will settle in place.”
As the day ends, Mrs Mhaka heads to the fowl run to feed her chickens. She makes up a perfect picture of life chosen out of sacrifice for a good cause-that of living off a farm sustainably.
