Saturday, June 4th

My week has been filled with meetings. For those who know me well, this is not my most favorite activity.

The Harare CNFA office is in the Zimbabwe Farmers Union Building and is hosted by that organization. The ZFU is one of several farmers’ associations; its constituency is the smallholders which are farmers with generally less than 10 hectares of land. Another association supports the large estate farmers (tea, coffee, bananas). The ZFU has been in existence for over 70 years and continues to represent the interests of the farmers to the Zimbabwe government, NGOs and other associations.

I was able to meet S.D. Hungwe, the President (elected) and Theresa Makomva, the Head of Operations as well as several “desks”. Violet Mandishona, the Contract Farming Desk, ensures that farmers are treated correctly by the large companies which produce agricultural inputs (seeds, fertilizer, agro chemicals, etc.) and contract to purchase the farmers’ crops. Philip Gumunyu ZFU Director of Agrodealers provides training and guidance for the village-level agrodealers.

The other meetings have been with input suppliers, insurance companies and NGOs. Their perspectives are invaluable as CNFA wants to improve the smallholder farmers’ access to markets with an input supply strategy. Zimbabwe has had a history of extreme financial distress. This has several consequences: as I mentioned, the US dollar is the currency of exchange. (2) Financial institutions are reluctant to lend to businesses or farmers. (3) The producers of agro inputs send goods to agrodealers on a consignment basis and therefore retain ownership rights. CNFA and US Aid are working to bring credit back to this supplier/agrodealer relationship.

On Wednesday afternoon, Taswell Chivere, CNFA Finance and Management Officer, and I boarded a bus for the ride from Harare to Bulawayo. We had been told that City Line used new, air conditioned buses with in-bus movies. Instead, we boarded a very old and extremely dirty bus (cockroaches) that had no air (hot or cold) and no suspension. Leaving 45 minutes late, we arrived in Bulawayo after 9pm. The lesson here relates to customer expectations: I have ridden older and dirtier buses in eastern Europe and Africa BUT I was expecting something very different than what City Line provided. The adage is “Under promise and over deliver”.

Bulawayo is Zimbabwe’s second largest city and very lovely. The CNFA office is a converted home and houses the majority of the Zimbabwe staff. It is the largest staff that I have seen in my CNFA work in southern and eastern Africa. Taswell and I briefly stopped into the office and then left for Esikhoveni, a Zimbabwe government training facility which CNFA is using for its agrodealer classes. 250 village agrodealers were selected by ZFU to attend 2 weeks of training: 1 week of Business Management and 1 week of Technical. I was able to sit in both groups and was asked to do a short lecture on “What does a banker want?” That group had 32 participants of which 10 were women. Most were in their 30’s. Sitting at lunch, I found that most had only one store. In the store, they sell general goods (sugar, Coke, flour, etc) as well as agro inputs. The store supports the activity in a village or small town. One participant had 3 stores, 40 hectares which he farmed, and 5 children (on the way to 10)!

It is now Saturday. It is a glorious day of blue sky, sunshine and very few clouds so I hobble out to see the town. Wishing all of you the very best for your weekend.