According to the National Water Policy recently launched by the Ministry of Water Resources Development and Management, given the importance of irrigation to revenue inflows and the need to revitalise the Zimbabwe National Water Authority and Catchment Councils, irrigation rehabilitation is pertinent.
The total developed irrigated area in 2000 was estimated at 200,000 hectares accounting for 80 percent of national water demand. Currently 135,000 hectares of the developed 200,000 is functional.
Decay of infrastructure
Power cuts have also contributed to the decline in irrigation use together with the general decay of irrigation infrastructure that resulted from the land reform in 2000.
“Since agriculture is the major consumer of water, because of this decline the capacity of ZINWA and Catchment Councils to raise revenues is likewise seriously curtailed,” the policy says.
While the policy does not give any details as to how this is going to be achieved, it says organisation and training of farmers to use water productively is crucial.
The policy also says farmers must be taught to generate sufficient return to meet the costs of operating and maintaining irrigation schemes. The policy calls for resources to be availed to develop new schemes on many underutilised dams.
“Also pertinent is for ZINWA to be capacitated both capitally and human resource wise for them to be able to perform their function of taking water to the farmers’ fields to ensure effective water delivery and billing for sustained revenue,” the policy says.
Under the policy, the government retains control of supply of water from source to field edge for all public and all corporate irrigation schemes and monitors the efficiency of in-field water usage and the quality of the return flow back to public streams.
Illegal mining
The government also acknowledged illegal mining was posing a serious threat to the environment and human health. Illegal mining exposes heavy metals that cause long term health problems to humans and animals, causes siltation of rivers threatening agriculture, and informal gold mining uses highly toxic metals such as mercury.
According to the Ministry of Water Resources Development and Management, a fully functional irrigated agriculture sector has the capacity to consume 82 percent of the country’s water resources.
Water usage by the sector is currently estimated at 20 percent in most catchment areas except Runde and Save catchments. These catchments are currently dominated by the sugar industry.
Post published in: News