Amid ongoing food and nutrition challenges, the United Nations has urged the government of Zimbabwe to upscale community horticulture projects.
This is expected to drive resilience and food security as the country’s agriculture sector prepares for the coming rainy season.
Government is already making preparations for the 2024/25 planting season amid uncertainty about rain and adequate agriculture inputs.
Community gardens are seen as providing better resilience for food sustainability with cities such as Bulawayo having more than fifty such projects.
“Community resilience in Zimbabwe, especially through agriculture and horticulture, is crucial in achieving SDGs, especially concerning poverty alleviation, zero hunger and economic growth,” said UN resident and humanitarian coordinator Edward Kallon.
The comments come as humanitarian agencies say communities across the country are facing hunger with millions requiring food assistance.
The agriculture ministry has encouraged urban councils to allow residents to contribute towards food security, but the UN notes more still needs to be done to escalate horticulture production within urban settings.
“Strengthening local agricultural practices, leveraging horticulture, building community capacities, policy and institutional support as well as enhancing food systems remain key perspectives to facilitate the production of horticulture,” said Edward.
The community horticulture gardens have especially been beneficial to the elderly who have been listed by agencies as the most vulnerable group regarding food insecurity.
60-something years old Susan Banda is a beneficiary of the community gardens and has defied the demands of her ageing bones to trudge to the local community garden and do the backbreaking work of tending to tomatoes, chomolia and onions.
She is one of hundreds of elderly women who work on a small piece of land allocated by the Bulawayo municipality for local residents to support themselves through growing their own food. While urban farming was for years outlawed by the city fathers, community gardens have thrived, supported by solar-powered boreholes donated to townships by humanitarian agencies.
However with a cycle of poor rains, boreholes have suffered the fate of depleting groundwater tables resulting in fears for the future operations of community gardens.
For Susan nevertheless, having a slot at the vegetable garden has meant she does not spend money she does not have on bare food necessities.
“My body is not what it used to be, but I keep doing this because if I stop, someone else will take over my piece of the garden,” Susan said.
Community gardens have long been a feature of this city and have helped cushion low-income families from the harsh economic conditions that have taken away food from many households. Banda’s community garden is one of more than fifty such projects scattered across the city supported by various philanthropic organisations.
Local governments have promoted community gardens by providing land, helping families feed themselves despite continuing hardships driven by economic circumstances, with food assistance now reaching the country’s urban areas.
The Zimbabwe Livelihood Assistance Committee says up to 41 percent of the urban population are food insecure, highlighting the urgency of local efforts being bridged by community gardens. While government has continued to distribute grain to vulnerable communities, community gardens have been hailed for augmenting food requirements as the gardens do not grow such staples as maize.
To highlight the extent of food needs, government announced that monthly grain requirements had peaked, with the addition of cash to needy families. “A total of 139 840 tonnes of grain is expected to be distributed during the months of August to October.
Regarding the Urban-Cash-for-Cereal Programme, beneficiary registration as well as data cleaning and validation is underway across urban domains,” said Information Minister Jenfan Muswere during a 10 September media briefing. Agencies such as the World Food Programme are already assisting with
grocery vouchers, yet beneficiaries still need farm produce such as tomatoes, onions, cabbages and other horticulture produce to ensure better livelihoods.
As the UN has emphasised, one of the issues that will help address this is the strengthening of resilience of community gardens.
The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), with financial support from the European Union, is driving he growth of community gardens in Zimbabwe and other African countries.
According to the UN agency, community gardens will help build resilience during natural disasters such
as drought as such initiatives rely on groundwater and renewable energy. For Banda and many others like her, that resilience is already evident as she able to feed herself amid the prevailing harsh economic conditions.
