No loans to actual farmers in Agribank’s ‘very good loan book’

 Agribank seems to have pulled off the neat trick of 'supporting agriculture,' but very carefully avoiding lending to the people who actually work the land; farmers.

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Agriculture minister's deeply flawed arguments against GMOs

Genetic modification of food crops is an emotive, deeply contentious issue almost all over the world, even in some countries where it is now established practice. So that Zimbabwe’s agriculture minister is against the practice is not unusual. But his stated reasons are embarrassingly, intellectually weak, especially for someone who has an advanced degree in agriculture.

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ZANU-PF’ ‘empowerment, MDC’s ‘more investment’ need not be seen as contradictory

ZANU-PF and the MDC will start 2012 with a heightened awareness that a crucial election for them and for the country is not far away, whatever the final dates will be. As the parties sell themselves to the voters, it has become clear that their visions of how to bring about an economically prosperous Zimbabwe are starkly different. But are ‘empowerment’ and ‘attracting investment’ best thought of as opposing philosophies, or as two sides of the same coin?

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Policy lags behind reality as GM foods flood into Zimbabwe and public calls for official acceptance increase

by Chido Makunike

During a severe drought-caused period of maize deficit more than a decade or so ago, Zimbabwe was confronted with the choice to accept or reject donated genetically modified food aid. The government chose to maintain its stance opposing the importation of GM maize as grain, but compromised on allowing it in if it was milled first; as ready-to-use flour. In recent years there have been significantly increased levels of importation of various processed food products known to have a GM component. This is making the official anti-GM policy look increasingly untenable. But as public calls for a revision of the policy increase, a new danger may be an unrealistic expectation of the benefits that GM crops can deliver in a political and economic environment where many of the structural issues that have caused such a steep decline in Zimbabwe’s agriculture remain un-addressed.

READ MORE - Policy lags behind reality as GM foods flood into Zimbabwe and public calls for official acceptance increase

Land and race in Zimbabwe: A new review, itself worthy of review, of the book ‘Mugabe and the White African’

Mugabe and the White African is a film about a white protagonist’s attempts to resist being moved off his farm by the government of President Robert Mugabe. It played to limited but sympathetic audiences in the West, but made no traction at all in Zimbabwe or anywhere else in the black world, which admittedly was not the target audience anyway. There were very few black reviews of it, and none that were positive. A book of the same name as the film, authored by the film lead’s son in law, has received an interesting scorching review by Percy Zvomuya in the Mail and Guardian.

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The effect a farming season’s maize surplus would have on Zimbabwe’s land reform

by Chido Makunike

After many years of stagnation and regression, there has in recent years been a sense of Zimbabwe’s agriculture being positively on the move. As the 2011/12 cropping season gets under way, if the rain pattern is favorable, the country will take another annual step towards what will be a watershed event with very far-reaching effects in Zimbabwe and beyond: the first maize surplus since land reform began a decade ago.

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What future for Zimbabwe’s Commercial Farmers’ Union?

From being one of Zimbabwe’s most powerful and influential non-governmental bodies, the Commercial Farmers Union struggles to be heard at all today. Most of its members have been unceremoniously dispossessed of their farms, leaving the representative body of the country’s large-scale white farmers struggling for relevance. Is there much of a future for the CFU?

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More examples of how donor dependence compromises African sovereignty

By most accounts, Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir is a nasty fellow. This alone wouldn't be enough to earn him being distanced by most of Africa's rulers, few of whom can be considered cute and cuddly fellows. But that al-Bashir is welcome in the company of African leaders is still odd because of the particular nature of his alleged badness. Arab al-Bashir is accused of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in Sudan's ethnically African Darfur region. One would have thought this would be one reason to make African leaders at least avoid al-Bashir like the plague, but that hasn't been the case. What gives?

READ MORE - More examples of how donor dependence compromises African sovereignty

Another eviction shows farm tenure security is a long way off

There has been a lot of loose talk recently about various schemes to avail finance to new, post-land reform farmers. Some of the details of a recent/on-going reported eviction of an 'old' white farmer show why security of tenure cannot be counted on as an element in giving financiers confidence to lend money for farming in Zimbabwe in any big way.

READ MORE - Another eviction shows farm tenure security is a long way off

Ministry of Agriculture hasn't updated its website in more than a year

If Zimbabwe's decade of deep economic problems meant that it fell behind many other countries in its development of an internet culture, in the last couple of years the country has begun to catch up. There is therefore absolutely no excuse for the Ministry of Agriculture to have last updated its website way back in 2010.

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Why Zimbabwe's farm expropriations will not be reversed after Mugabe

by Chido Makunike

In the Western media it is called 'Mugabe's land grab.' That terminology is partly to indicate not just the reality of how it was done, but to also show deep disapproval. Indeed, expropriating land from white farmers is one of the main reasons Mugabe is now depicted as a particular figure of hate in the West. However, a side effect of the narrative that he simply took productive land out of a fit of racial hate and then parceled it out to his 'cronies' is that it gives the false impression that Zimbabwe's controversial land reform might be temporary; to be reversed after 'dictator Mugabe' exits the scene. Here's in brief why that is not going to happen.

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Zim land reform: unsustainable new farming system replacing an unsustainable old system

Why land reform of one kind or another had to take place in Zimbabwe is well known, as are the problems that have resulted from the method that was chosen. While the new, still-in-progress system of agriculture is clearly not meeting the various needs required of it, an article about the current eviction of one of the remaining farmers from the old system also points to how it was a system that despite being once highly functional, had fallen behind the times in many ways. The old system has been decimated, but the new system cannot really work as currently structured. It is becoming clear that shifting ownership of who occupies which land is just one step in a long process of coming up with a new system of land management and of agriculture.

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A slightly more balanced article about transplanted Zimbabwean farmers' challenges in Nigeria

There is yet another article, this time on the BBC, tracking the progress of the white Zimbabwean farmers who were invited to setup shop by a regional government in Nigeria.While most such article have depicted the handful of Zim farmers as almost miracle workers suddenly transforming Nigerian agriculture while the locals look on expectantly and helplessly, this one is a little bit more honest about the great challenges the farmers face in their new environment.

READ MORE - A slightly more balanced article about transplanted Zimbabwean farmers' challenges in Nigeria

Farm lease changes unlikely to make banks eager to dole out loans

After Zimbabwe's land reform (or land grab, depending on your point of view), it was belatedly realized that possession did not automatically lead to productivity and wealth. Among the many impediments to farm productivity identified is the fact that the new farmers are lease-holders rather than owners of the land they work, and so cannot use that land as collateral to apply for bank finance. Changes have been made to the clauses of the 99-year leases to take into account the reasons for banks' reluctance to get involved in farm lending. Although the bankers' association is reported to be pleased and reassured about those changes, it is a patchwork solution that is unlikely to achieve the desired results.

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The shift in Zimbabwe's farming profile

Many African countries have decided that their heavy reliance on small scale farmers is one reason for low productivity and recurrent food shortages. This is one reason they are encouraging the controversial practice of letting big foreign agro concerns to come in and lease or buy huge portions of farmland. Zimbabwe has effectively gone the other direction, from dominance by large scale farmers to almost exclusive reliance on small and medium scale farmers. Is one more 'right' than the other?

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Zimbabwean farmers in Nigeria: As many questions as answers

There is yet another article about the experience of Zimbabwean farmers who were recruited to Nigeria by a regional governor. But as with many previous such articles, there remain many unanswered questions about what the important lessons are for agricultural development in Nigeria, or anywhere else in Africa.

READ MORE - Zimbabwean farmers in Nigeria: As many questions as answers

Zimbabwe-influenced Julius Malema stirs the land reform pot in South Africa

The controversy-loving Julius Malema has just been re-elected as president of the youth wing of South Africa's ruling ANC party. He wasted no time in raising the hackles and fear of many by reiterating a call for radical land reform, even if it is to be without compensation. For both his detractors and opponents, the experience of Zimbabwe looms very large for South Africa in this debate.

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Is it time for Zimbabwe to give up trying to grow wheat?

As Zimbabwe's wheat production continues to decline precipitously each year, the viability of growing this crop at all versus importing it will have to be assessed.

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Official Independence Day speech

by Chido Makunike
My dear subjects,

On this year’s anniversary of our independence, there is much for us to celebrate. I congratulate myself and fellow ruling clique members for our heroic role in the liberation struggle many decades ago. It continues to give us the steam and the cover by which to continue ruling you today. We enjoy the material privileges and the impunity to do anything we please and get away with it. That is why we so joyfully celebrate this occasion, even as many of you are discouraged and disillusioned about Independence.

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Climate change: the need to move away from a maize-based diet

by Chido Makunike

Sadza may become a luxury food that only a very few wealthy people can afford. For the rest of us it may become a food that we only eat on special occasions. Given the centrality of sadza in the Zimbabwean diet, this would be a development of potentially calamitous dietary and social implications.

How did this developing disaster arise?

READ MORE - Climate change: the need to move away from a maize-based diet