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Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe suffers from a very low life expectancy of 44 years of age and a high infant mortality rate of 90 per 1 000 live births. In addition to these health issues, 30 percent or 3.7 million Zimbabweans, out of a total population 12.6 million, are chronically malnourished.

FAO's main in-country programmes

Special Programme for Food Security (SPFS)
The SPFS in Zimbabwe was operational through 2000 and its main objective was to improve food security through rapid increase in productivity and food production on an economically and environmentally sustainable basis. It demonstrated how agricultural production could be intensified and diversified through improved on-farm irrigation technologies such as drip irrigation and treadle pumps and through improved on-farm water management practices, agronomic methods and the training of national staff and farmers.  The project was piloted in the agro-ecological regions III, IV and V where most of Zimbabwe’s smallholder farmers live and depend largely on rain-fed agriculture. It targeted smallholder farmers who experienced household food insecurity owing to the adverse effects of drought, poor water management, marginal soils, the prevalence of pests and diseases and poor marketing structures. As a result, the Government of Zimbabwe adopted the concept of promoting sustainable development of irrigation as well as ownership by farmers.

National Programme for Food Security (NPFS)
The country’s programme for food security is premised on FAO’s framework on food security and is directed at the production, storage and distribution of food to the nation. Its five pillars are: 

• stabilization of macro-economic environment;
• transformation of the food economy;
• community empowerment and poverty reduction;
• decentralization, integration and sustainable use of resources;
• food insecurity and vulnerability monitoring information system.  

The government introduced crop and livestock input schemes, the farm mechanization programme, the food and nutrition council, the strengthening of research and extension services, as well as research into traditional food crops suited to the ecological conditions of the agricultural regions. These ideas operated with the aim of enhancing food production and reducing food insecurity. FAO’s interventions under the Regular Programme and the Emergency and Rehabilitation Coordination Unit have been targeted at complementing government efforts to ensure household and national food security.    

Emergency Prevention System for Transboundary Animals and Plant Pests and Diseases (EMPRES) - Animal Health Component
Zimbabwe, like all southern African countries, has never reported Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI)/H5N1 outbreaks. However, the country has reinforced its preparedness to the disease with the support of FAO through three regional projects providing emergency assistance for early detection and prevention of HPAI in eastern and southern Africa, control of Avian Influenza in the southern Africa region and strengthening institutions for risk management of Transboundary Animal Diseases (TADs) in the SADC region. 

Over the past year, Zimbabwe reported the following EMPRES priority diseases: foot-and-mouth disease (FMD), anthrax, rabies, lumpy skin disease and Newcastle disease. In the recent past, Zimbabwe was a beneficiary country of several national projects on control of anthrax and rabies, the progressive elimination of Newcastle disease, surveillance and the control of FMD and the provision of vaccines. FAO is currently implementing a regional project addressing several TADs (with a specific focus on FMD and contagious bovine pleuropneumonia, with disease risk assessment and early warning system reinforcement as main activities. 

Zimbabwe is in the geographic coverage of the FAO-World Organization for Animal Health, jointly established Regional Animal Health Centre located in Gaborone, Botswana - which covers all SADC countries and therefore participates in regional training and meetings on TADs. 

EMPRES Desert Locust Component
FAO co-funded the hosting of the east and southern Africa ministerial meeting on Red Locusts, which was held in Harare in 2009. Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe attended.

Emergency and rehabilitation
Since 2002, the country has experienced an increase in humanitarian interventions, and the FAO Emergency Rehabilitation and Coordination Unit has been actively involved in implementing the following programmes to boost agricultural production and ensure food security in Zimbabwe: 

• agricultural input support to vulnerable smallholder farmers, coupled with extension and training;
• seed multiplication;
• crop diversification by promoting production of cassava, small grains and legumes;
• conservation agriculture;
• animal production and health through disease surveillance and livestock vaccinations against new castle, foot and mouth, anthrax, rabies and tick-borne diseases;
• avian influenza awareness,
• mainstreaming HIV/AIDS, food and nutrition, and
• coordination of humanitarian interventions in the agricultural sector.

Key donors in FAO’s humanitarian interventions over the last seven years include the European Union, Department for International Development, Sweden, Spain, Ireland, Norway and USA. 

ONE UN – One Programme
FAO is operating within the Zimbabwe United Nations Development Assistance Framework (ZUNDAF) for 2007 through 2011. The framework was endorsed by the government and is anchored in the Millennium Development Goals. The ZUNDAF thematic groups have now been aligned with the government clusters with the objective of turning around the country’s economy under the inclusive government formed in 2009. FAO chairs the agriculture, land and environment thematic group and is also a member of the agrarian sector technical review group of the multi donor trust fund, which is managed by the World Bank.

last updated: 2 August 2011