The Sunday News
Sharon Chimenya, Sunday News Reporter
AFTER the attainment of independence in 1980, Zimbabwe has been in a drive to empower locals with one of the major milestone being agricultural development.
Masvingo Province is one of the provinces that have benefitted immensely from the agricultural development as it now has two major dams and is targeting about 74 000 hectares of new and old irrigation schemes from the period 2021-2025.
Masvingo Minister of State for Provincial Affairs and Devolution, Cde Ezra Chadzamira said that one of the issues that made Zimbabweans to go to war against the British colonial rule was that of land, in which the black people were allocated only 29,9 percent of the entire land in the country, which had no fertile soils.
He said that after independence the government looked into the issues of land imbalance, resuscitation of chieftainship and also education.
“In the second phase of the economic recovery, the National Development Strategy 1 (NDS1) has seen the country constructing more dams. As Masvingo Province we have a lot of water compared to other province and we constitute more than 50,4 percent of the national water content. We are lucky that we are going to have another big dam Tende Runde in Chivi and at the end of its construction Masvingo will be having more than 60 percent of the national water content.
Masvingo will be the bread basket of the nation and since our country is an agro based economy, this means that Masvingo will achieve the national vision of the upper middle economy before 2030. We have a lot of land as a Province and we have targeted 74 000 hectares under the irrigation scheme both new and old during the 2021-2025 period.”
Cde Chadzamira said that the dams in the Province such as the Tugwi Mukosi and the Mutirikwi dams which are the largest inland dams in the country will benefit the local people through irrigation development.
“At Tugwi Mukosi there are a lot of opportunities that the local community shall be able to do, there shall also be the development of a town, so stands will be allocated, hotels, and recreational facilities,” he said.
The province has targeted the development of the Muzhwi-Mushandike canal which will uplift the lives of more than 3 000 families, Mutirikwi upstream, where they have target the development of 3 000 hectares, Banga irrigation with 8 000 hectares and Buffalo Range with 4 000. In Chilonga the government has targeted for the development of new irrigation schemes in Chilonga 1,2 and 3 where more than 15 000 hectares are to be utilised.
“Regardless of the challenges that we have, like in any other country, challenges such as the natural disaster and the artificial disasters like economic sanctions, President Mnangagwa is using our own resources to build our own country. There are a lot of achievements that have taken place after independence, because of independence we have peace in our country which speaks to the development that we have,” said Cde Chadzamira.
