eBusiness Weekly
Tawanda Musarurwa
Over the last couple of decades Zimbabwe has witnessed the growing significance of small-to-medium agricultural producers, but the attention paid to agricultural mechanisation as a means to enhance agricultural productivity has been rather inconsistent.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation, an arm of the United Nations (FAO), “mechanisation is a crucial input for agricultural crop production and one that historically been neglected in the context of developing countries.
Factors that reduce the availability of farm power compromise the ability to cultivate sufficient land and have long been recognised as a source of poverty, especially in sub-Saharan Africa.”
Major constraint
However, shortage of farm power and machinery on most farms in the country is a major constraint to agricultural productivity, especially insofar as smallholder farmers constitute about 75 percent of the total farming population in Zimbabwe and rely fundamentally on draught animal power.
Agricultural mechanism with respect to Zimbabwe’s smallholder farm producers has been the missing link in the efficient utilisation, preservation and value addition in the exploitation of the country’s natural resources.
In ideal circumstances mechanisation is a major input to agriculture, and is one way of maximising farm production. But agricultural mechanisation is in itself a viable economic activity.
Although agricultural mechanisation comes at a cost for the initial capital outlay, the long-term benefits usually outweigh the costs, with wider ramifications for the broader economy.
That is, for instance, a ramp up in the supply side of agricultural machinery is simultaneously an enhancement of that section of industry, especially if there is an encouragement for locally produced farm equipment.
There is, however, need for appreciation that this critical area in agricultural production cannot be left solely as a function of the State.
Private sector role
Developing agricultural mechanisation for economic growth requires public and private partnerships with clearly defined roles and goals. The public sector formulates policies that create a conducive environment and standards for industry to play its part in the manufacture or importation of farm machinery, distribution and then finally utilisation by farmers. Agricultural mechanisation issues are complex, real, varied, inter-linked, constantly shifting, and require careful planning.
Agricultural mechanisation development is a process that cannot be dealt with in isolation.
“The purpose of a sustainable mechanisation strategy is to create an enabling policy framework, as well as an institutional and market environment in which farmers and other end-users have a wide choice of farm power and equipment suited to their needs within a sustainable delivery and support system,” says FAO.
The development of agricultural mechanisation in any country, but more so for developing countries such as Zimbabwe, requires research and development, capacity building, public-private partnerships and scientific information exchange through linkages at local, regional and international level.
Government, private companies and individuals have been importing agricultural machinery and equipment, for instance, the national agricultural mechanisation programme that was implemented by the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) between 2007 and 2008. Other agricultural mechanisation projects were implemented by Farmers’ World and the Zimbabwe Agro Dealers Association (ZIADA), with at least 6000 tractors being imported since 2004.
Structured approach
However, there is need for a structured approach. An institutionalised multi-sectoral approach can ensure that the mechanisation inputs are availed to producers in a manner that allow for sustainable usage.
Since the introduction of the multi-currency system and economy-wide recovery the country’s agricultural sector has seen a number of new players, not least in the tobacco sub-sector whose upturn per se has considerably boosted agricultural growth forecasts.
However, small-scale farmers spanning the agricultural sector are largely utilising antiquated farm machinery.
Agricultural mechanisation in Zimbabwe faces a number of challenges some of which include the shortage of farm power, low uptake of farm mechanisation technologies and lack of support infrastructure.
To this extent Zimbabwe needs to develop an agricultural mechanisation that specifically caters for small scale farmers, and at the same time seek to revitalise the existing systems, which have traditionally only supported large scale farmers.
There is a highly diversified supply industry in Zimbabwe that has been developed over a 90-year period to cater for the needs of communal and large scale commercial farmers primarily for crop and livestock production. Effort towards developing small and medium scale agro-processing industries has been minimal.
High costs
Agricultural experts say the country’s supply industry was seriously affected by economic environment in the past two decades in which production capacity dwindled due to lack of capital to import raw materials and components/machinery.
This resulted in delays in the supply of mechanisation inputs to farmers and processors.
The high cost of machinery has also resulted in low uptake of mechanisation inputs. Ideally the supply industry should develop a capacity to identify needs of farmers and strengthen its capacity to develop, manufacture, distribute and maintain products to stay relevant.
The experts contend that agricultural mechanisation has a number of essential benefits including, among others: increasing the power inputs to farming activities, hence putting more land into production, improving the timeliness and efficiency of farm operations, improving the quality and value of work, the production of processed products, and provision of agriculture-led industrialisation and markets for rural economic growth.
