I HAD an interesting conversation with my friend and farmer, Mr Doubt Ndebele last weekend and it got me thinking.
The discussion revolved around strategies that could be adopted by farmers and local authorities in preventing livestock losses due to road accidents and as well as preventing unnecessary loss of human life in some cases.
My friend argued that drivers get involved in accidents involving livestock usually at night and this is primarily because cattle are not very visible from afar at night and by the time the driver notices a herd of cattle sleeping on the tarmac it will already be late.
Therefore we need to make livestock, especially cattle, visible from afar so that drivers can brake and avoid collision with animals.
In short we need animals to be collared with reflective material so that they can be easily identifiable from afar and an accident avoided.
This might sound absurd at first but if you think about it seriously this could save farmers a lot of losses due to road carnage and people’s lives, vehicles and other properties can be saved as well.
Surely if we can design reflective jackets and vests for human beings who are more intelligent and more discerning than cattle I think it’s imperative that we need the same precautionary attitude for our drivers and livestock on our roads. A human being has the intelligence to notice and hear a vehicle coming at night and pull out of the road but animals are not that smart.
This does not need to be expensive reflective material perhaps something like the ones we stick on our vehicles and maybe wider.
Then local authorities can institute by-laws that compel all farmers whose animals have access to highways to collar their animals with reflective material failure to which a fine can be charged on the farmer.
While this may not be exactly ground breaking technology it is certainly an innovation that can answer and solve a nightmare of livestock losses by farmers and the real threat of being sued by vehicle owners for damages and repairs.
In my books this is the kind of innovation that should be coming from our research institutions, polytechnics and universities.
Innovation that talks direct to the needs of the farmer and scratching exactly where it’s itching.
I have made submissions before lamenting the aloofness of some of our research institutions and lack of applicability and relevance of their so-called researches.
To me an agro-based research institution should be churning out new technologies and innovations all the time in answer to problems and challenges afflicting farmers.
The verbose high sounding latin laden empty research findings do not help my mother uMakhumalo in Mzola who has to contend with agro related challenges such as livestock predators.
Researchers should stop focusing on high profile empty deliverables white collar symposia that marvel and drool at worthless publications of little significance to the day to day lives of farmers and start asking questions around real challenges afflicting farmers.
An example of a simple but critical area that needs innovation is preventing breed “contamination” in a communal set-up. How can a farmer who is trying to improve the breed of his herd avoid “contamination” of his herd in an open communal management system?
If a nose ring can be used to prevent a calf from suckling what can I use as a farmer to prevent inferior bulls (iminjanja) from mounting my good breed cows and siring inferior animals?
The question might seem absurd and the thinking weird but believe you me, you come up with a method to avoid unwanted mating between inferior bulls and good quality animals you have a solved a nightmare for most small holder communal livestock farmers who by the way contribute the largest portion of the national herd.
Please do not talk about fences and paddocks because they have failed in most communal set-ups because of the haphazard type of settlement. Castrating these inferior bulls is not practical because they are individually owned and collective castration has not worked yet.
So as a farmer I need a device that I can put on my cow to deter unintended bulls from mating with my cows and perhaps remove the device when they are in the kraal so that my preferred bull can mate with the cows.
A chastity belt of some sort! There is room for innovation if we apply our minds. Think of the guy who put an opening nob on our shoe polish tins and served us from knocking the tins on walls and floors in trying to open! What about the guy who invented a fuel syphoning pipe that you easily move in and out of the fuel container and it starts syphoning? It is possible.
Feedback mazikelana@gmail.com <mailto:mazikelana@gmail.com> cell 0772851275