ED, Mthuli must take seriously World Bank advice

During the 2016-17 agricultural season, the Government of Zimbabwe sunk over US$2 billion in a scheme known as command agriculture.
In fact, actual figures have never really been ascertained as it involves a twisty paper trail with several players across a number of ministries and Government departments. Some estimates put the money that was spent on command agriculture at around US$3 billion.
MDC-A vice president Tendai Biti through the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Public Accounts has tried to unpack the murky financial dealings around the financing of command agriculture but failed to get to bottom of it.
His committee has been frustrated at every turn.
This has led to concerns that some bigwigs in politics and business looted the money using command agriculture as a vehicle to facilitate that plunder.
No arrests have been made or investigations started other than the digging by Biti and company.
Currently, Government is bankrolling two more agriculture initiatives, the Presidential Inputs Scheme and Pfumvudza. Due to a number of weaknesses in the programme – experts are already warning that the schemes will not realise the expected yields.
Just last week, the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) issued a statement warning against “theft, misuse and abuse” of the inputs. This followed the arrest of one Sekai Roki.
Nhau has previously reported on the theft and abuse of inputs. Our teams went on the ground in Mashonaland East and actually bought the inputs. The practice of selling inputs is rampant.
But the selling by beneficiaries at the end of the line is just a tip of the iceberg. The real corruption starts at the very top where money exchanges hands before inputs are bought and distributed.
Greed and corruption, which is caused by the deliberate weaknesses in the programme, guarantee failure of these “freebies” programmes.
Locals like Biti and others have tried to take Government to task and to warn authorities about these inherent flaws but it appears the advice falls on deaf ears. Now the World Bank has spoken – urging Zimbabwe to abandon increased agricultural spending as it has failed to boost productivity despite spending billions.
Speaking during a webinar on Investment Priorities for Climate-Smart Agriculture in Zimbabwe co-hosted by the WB, Finance and Lands ministries, World Bank Country Director, Mukami Kariuki urged Government to consider refocusing priorities in agriculture.
“As increased agriculture spending has not yielded greater productivity, key sources of recovery such as finance, policy and infrastructure need to be reoriented,” she said.
“With the threat of recurrent drought costing Zimbabwe about 7.3 percent of GDP every year, growing vulnerability is a concern.
“Restoring economic health through sustainable fiscal policy, alongside investments in markets, water access and improved technologies will have an enormous impact on the sector.”
The advice by the World Bank comes at a time Zimbabwe has sunk billions of dollars in foreign currency into the agricultural sector in an attempt to boost productivity but has failed, for 20 years.
The country is also highly dependent on climate; a primarily rainfed, low technology production base, low adaptive capacity, and large seasonal climatic variability. It is estimated that Zimbabwe’s 15-20 percent agriculture contribution to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) will decline to a paltry 2 percent if urgent measures are not taken.
It is also observed that the country will be hotter and drier in future and under a changing climate, maize, the staple food crop in Zimbabwe, is expected to see a 33 percent yield reduction by the 2030s.
The increases in temperature are estimated to result in decreases in the income generated by beef cattle. Thus channeling the resources the country is wasting in efforts that are not yielding results to other more appropriate and forward-looking programmes is the only way out.
Climate smart initiatives are the way to go. Mnangagwa and his ministers of Finance and Agriculture must heed the advice from the World Bank and ditch the agricultural programmes that drain the fiscus for no gain. Nhau/Indaba

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