Hunger averted for hundreds of Hwedza families as women access land and farm inputs

In her 35 years of marriage with her husband Morgan Goto, Roselyn helped her husband in the fields owned by Morgan who every year marketed the produce as “head of the family”. Mrs. Goto says her life has never been the same again ever since she became a member of Conservation Women Farming Project, operating from Gonese area (Ward 12) in Hwedza District in Manicaland Province.

The Project is a brainchild of AAAI Zimbabwe introduced in six provinces in Zimbabwe whose focus is to increase poor women’s access and control over land ownership as a means of improving their livelihoods and those of their families. The Provinces include Manicaland, Mashonaland East, Mashonaland West, Matabeleland North, Matabeleland South and Midlands.

Mrs. Goto joined Goneso Conservation Women Farming project, which comprised 153 women farmers in 2008 at the height of a drought affecting the Goneso area. The area falls under natural region 4 which is prone to droughts.  Mrs. Goto negotiated for a piece of land from her husband and was able to plant her crops on after receiving seed from AAI ZIMBABWE and training on conservation farming. 

“We kicked hunger out of the house following my first harvest in 2009 from the conservation project. We increased our meals from one to three times a day. From the 2009 harvests, I sold maize and got $40 which I used to buy two goats.” In addition, Mrs. Goto was selected the best farmer in her area under the Conservation Farming Project in 2010 and a field day was hosted on her farm in the same year.

Mrs. Goto says from her harvests in 2009, she managed to pass on seed to one woman farmer, Mrs. Mutemerere as is required by the project. Mrs. Goto has sold her excess seed at subsidized prices to other women in the community who are not part of the project resulting in more women accessing seed in the Gonese community.

“In 2010, I started a broiler chicken project together with five other women from Conservation Project.  We use stock feed from Conservation Project for the chicken project. As at February 2011, we had 50 chickens which we are selling locally,” says Mrs. Goto.  They are selling a bird for $6. “We have also started a garden project where we are producing onions and sugar beans which we also sell locally. Our biggest challenge however has been that we do not have markets for our produce and the chickens,” says Mrs. Goto.

About  700 women farmers,  comprising married, widowed and single women between the ages of 25 and 60 own pieces of land passed on to them through negotiations with their husbands or village heads under the Conservation Farming project in Hwedza District. They plant various crops such a maize, sunflower, cowpeas, sugar beans and pumpkin seed under the project. The women receive open pollinated seeds which can be recycled and planted for in the following three years. Recycled seed will be readily available within communities.  The seed is also drought resistant and can survive in difficult conditions compared to hybrid seed. The women who receive seed passes on their seed from their produce when they harvest to another group of farmers who become members of the Conservation farming project.

The first group of women to benefit from the Conservation farming project in Hwedza were 153 in the 2008 and 2009 farming season.  These passed on seed to another 153 farmers in the 2009-2010 farming season.  In the 2009-2010 season AAI ZIMBABWE   gave another 100 farmers seed and these passed on the seed to another 100 farmers in the 2010-2011 farming season.  AAI ZIMBABWE   also made available seed to 200 more farmers in the 2010-2011 farming seed and these are expected to pass on the seed to another 100 farmers in the 2011-2012 farming season.

“The health status of people has improved as they now eat various healthy food stuff such as peanut butter, beans and cowpea leaves. Communication with husbands has improved because the women are now bringing food on the table for the families. About seven groups of women are now running garden projects and six groups are running chicken projects using seed money and stock feed from the conservation farming project,” says  Mrs. Matorwa, chairperson of the Conservation Farming Project at Gonese.