Contributing towards Zimbabwe’s Food Security by 2050

Sustainable Development Goal 2 focuses on the issue of food-seeking to “end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture.” This aligns with our work in Rural Transformation and Sustainable Livelihoods (RTSL) to ensure food security in the communities we serve by catalysing the adoption of the climate-smart “Pfumvudza” farming approach.

The fertile Zimbabwean land can provide thriving crops, high yielding harvests and food security to every household. Yet, 2.61 million people in rural Zimbabwe face high levels of acute food insecurity.

Through  Pfumvudza, which means ‘New Season’, we are implementing a low cost, low input, climate-proofed sustainable agriculture model that yields enough maize to feed a rural family of six for one whole year on a plot measuring 39m x 16m or 1/16th of a hectare.

For our pilot, which launched in 2020, we invested in learning more about this simple yet profound agricultural innovation and trained over 233 community champions through a partnership with Foundations for Farming – a regional leader in the area of conservation agriculture for many years.

In the FY2020/21 farming season, we then planted 2,484 Pfumvudza plots covering 156 hectares in 14 districts across 5 of the nation’s provinces. The pilot agricultural output is estimated to be 1,863 tonnes and projected to fund food provision initiatives for vulnerable Higherlife Fellows and contribute to the payment of school fees for vulnerable students.

With harvesting currently underway, we will continue to do our part to ensure Zimbabwe becomes an upper-middle-income, food-secure economy and target to invest in 20,000 plots in the coming season.

Through Pfumvudza lies the future where more and more Zimbabweans can feed their families from their land, and Zimbabwe can reclaim its status of the “Breadbasket of Africa” once again. Watch a video on our work in Pfumvudza here.


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