{"id":7861,"date":"2019-04-23T14:24:53","date_gmt":"2019-04-23T14:24:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.com\/zimbabwe\/?p=7861"},"modified":"2019-04-23T19:09:06","modified_gmt":"2019-04-23T19:09:06","slug":"former-aid-recipients-become-aid-providers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/former-aid-recipients-become-aid-providers","title":{"rendered":"Former aid recipients become aid providers"},"content":{"rendered":"

FARMERS are singing, dancing and ululating: \u201cMari kuvarimi iriyakayaka iritii!\u201d It means \u201cfarmers are getting immeasurable money\u201d and it is a verse they sing over and over again.<\/span><\/p>\n

They are happy to have money in their pockets after selling their sorghum harvest to the World Food Programme (WFP). The energy is palpable as the farmers shepherd their bounty through WFP\u2019s quality control checks. Some watch as the moisture content of the sorghum is checked. Others weigh and seal their sacks of grain. They stack them together, a season\u2019s worth of hard work, now awaiting shipment to a storage facility for eventual distribution to needy compatriots.<\/p>\n

This is no ordinary transaction and their excitement goes beyond the simple thrill of the sale. Rather, it is the culmination of a year\u2019s long effort that turned humanitarian aid recipients into aid providers.<\/p>\n

The farmers are beneficiaries of USAID\u2019s Enhancing Nutrition, Stepping Up Resilience and Enterprise (Ensure) project. These farmers were unable to meet their household food needs and were long-term recipients of humanitarian assistance before the Ensure project began in 2013.<\/p>\n

They celebrate because they are now able to meet their own food needs and sell the surplus, making an income while feeding fellow Zimbabweans in food insecure areas.<\/p>\n

Gogo Makazvita Mahlavira is among these farmers. \u201cThe price is very competitive,\u201d she says, \u201cbecause they are providing transport and the bags for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

With USAID support, WFP is buying the sorghum at $326,85 per tonne from farmers in five chronically food insecure districts. This represents a double win: farmers profit while USAID saves on transport costs by sourcing emergency food supplies locally.<\/p>\n

Between 1,5 and three million urban residents and approximately 2,9 million rural Zimbabweans were estimated to be food insecure during the peak of the 2018\/19 lean season, the time between October to March when vulnerable families are often forced to turn to food aid after depleting their harvests from the previous season.<\/p>\n

Her sale this year was modest, but Gogo believes that in 2019 she will harvest as much as two tonnes of sorghum. Zimbabwe\u2019s economy has been deteriorating for some time and private sector buyers have been inconsistent. In 2017, Gogo planned to sell her crops to a local company, but after agreeing to terms the company never finalised the sale, leaving her scrambling to find a viable market.<\/p>\n

The transparency and reliability of USAID\u2019s initiative has given her renewed confidence. \u201cNow we have a vision,\u201d she says of her community. \u201cWe see and know where we are going, so I am going to commit my time to planting sorghum.\u201d<\/p>\n

A long journey<\/p>\n

The farmers\u2019 journey started years ago when Ensure helped them organise production and marketing groups. These groups of 30 to 60 farmers share information and market their products together, achieving economies of scale that are a challenge for smallholder farmers working alone.<\/p>\n

Jane Pasipamire, a market facilitator trained by Ensure, says the project \u201ctrained us to secure markets so that we know where we are selling our product before we start planting. Together with other market facilitators, we went to Harare and pitched our product to WFP.\u201d<\/p>\n

In WFP they found an enthusiastic buyer.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn 2018 we purchased a total of 1 200 tonnes, 10% of the required sorghum for food assistance, from smallholder farmers across the country,\u201d said Eddie Rowe, WFP country director. \u201cWe realised that most of the people getting food aid are smallholder farmers, hence this is a way to get them to be more food secure and earn additional income. By providing the market for the sorghum, we intend to encourage further production.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Ensure project also trained the farmers on post-harvest handling techniques so that they have a quality product to sell.<\/p>\n

A harvest worth the dollars<\/p>\n

Catharine Dukute harvested one tonne of sorghum, the average tonnage for most farmers in Buhera district this season. Buhera is a rural area located in eastern Zimbabwe.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis area is very dry, and we experience very low rains; our crops die each farming season. This season, our maize crop failed completely. Now we have started growing drought resistant crops like sorghum to survive,\u201d Dukute explained. \u201cMy husband and I woke up as early as 4:30 each morning to plant the sorghum. We knew that it was going to be our source of income.\u201d Catharine wants to build a new home with her profits.<\/p>\n

Miriam Tavengwa from Chivi district wears a big smile as she calculates the number of bags she is selling. \u201cI have 53 bags of sorghum\u200a\u2014\u200aa total of 2,6 tonnes!\u201d she says, jumping with excitement.<\/p>\n

\u201cI cannot wait to get my money. I am expecting over $900. I will buy more cattle, send my child to university and my grandchildren to school, and start growing groundnuts for sale. I will also stock up on our daily food needs,\u201d she says. \u201cWe have realised that sorghum is now a cash crop. We can now get money through selling sorghum, a drought resistant crop.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ensure is more than an agricultural project. Households also benefit from education about nutrition, disaster risk reduction and income generating activities. Ensure aims to build resilience as well as profitability.<\/p>\n

But for the farmers it is all about the profits and a gratifying sense of giving back to their country, as the empowered beneficiaries sing and congratulate each other.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs USAID, we are proud that these households, who were once accustomed to receiving aid, are now providing it by selling their surplus production through a market-building humanitarian response mechanism,\u201d said USAID\/Zimbabwe Mission director Stephanie Funk.<\/p>\n

This appreciation is also shared by USAID\u2019s beneficiaries. \u201cWe are excited that we are now donors of food aid,\u201d says Miriam. \u201cOther families are going to benefit from our hard work in their time of need, just as USAID helped us in our time of need.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

FARMERS are singing, dancing and ululating: \u201cMari kuvarimi iriyakayaka iritii!\u201d It means \u201cfarmers are getting immeasurable money\u201d and it is a verse they sing over and over again. They are happy to have money in their pockets after selling their sorghum harvest to the World Food Programme (WFP). The energy is palpable as the farmers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":7864,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[156,116,419,278],"class_list":["post-7861","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-community","tag-economy-of-zimbawe","tag-farmers","tag-us","tag-villagers"],"yoast_head":"\nFormer aid recipients become aid providers - zimbabwe<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/former-aid-recipients-become-aid-providers\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Former aid recipients become aid providers\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"FARMERS are singing, dancing and ululating: \u201cMari kuvarimi iriyakayaka iritii!\u201d It means \u201cfarmers are getting immeasurable money\u201d and it is a verse they sing over and over again. 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