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Agriculture and Food Security
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
Weekly Media Update 2005-34
Monday September 5^th – Sunday September 11^th 2005

THE chaos characterising the agricultural sector ahead of the 2005/6 farming season and the country’s precarious food situation also hogged the media limelight in the week.

The media carried 68 stories on the topic, 35 of which appeared on ZBH (ZTV [20], Power FM [11] and Radio Zimbabwe [4]) and three on Studio 7. The government Press published 16 stories and the private papers 14.

In a rare display of unity, all media agreed that the lack of preparedness in the agricultural sector pointed to a disastrous farming season. ZTV (6/9, 6pm & 8pm) and Power FM (6/9, 8pm) broke the news on an impending calamity when they carried detailed reports on damning submissions by farmers and agro-based industries to the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Lands and Agriculture exposing the problems besetting the sector. These ranged from acute shortages of fuel, inputs and equipment to a lack of financial resources.

The next day, The Herald, Chronicle, The Daily Mirror and Studio 7 (7/9), also reported on the matter.

ZBH reported farmers claiming that although government had pledged $7 trillion for the development of agriculture ($3 trillion for irrigation and $4 trillion for inputs), none of them had received it.

Zimbabwe Farmers’ Union’s Dzarira Kwenda, for example, told ZTV and Power FM (6/9, 8pm) that the money issue was being "talked about but nothing is happening", adding, "a lot of time is being spent with people in government fighting for roles to play in the whole thing".

Similarly, The Herald and Chronicle quoted Zimbabwe Farmers’ Union president Silas Hungwe painting a grim picture on preparations for the next season. Said Hungwe: "The planning season starts in August and we do not know when we are going to get fertiliser, chemicals and seed".

The media also cited fertiliser companies, seed producers and equipment manufacturers testifying on their inability to meet farmers’ demands unless they were allocated foreign currency to import the necessary inputs.

In fact, Agriculture Dealers Manufacturers Association vice-president Walter Chigwada was reported in the government dailies as saying the situation was so serious that his association would not be able to provide even disc-harrows for tractors. This, Chigwada revealed, was unprecedented because "we have never run out of discs in Zimbabwe".

However, despite ZBH’s initial candid coverage, the national public broadcaster later carried reports that either contradicted its earlier stories or were laced with editorial intrusions that insincerely depicted government as having already fulfilled its part of the bargain. For instance, while the ZBH previously reported players in the farming sector blaming government for the confusion surrounding preparations for the farming season, Power FM (7/9, 6am) tried to blame the private sector. It noted: Government has played its part by the provision of funding (but) the private sector has not lived up to expectation."

Similarly, while Power FM (7/9, 6am) initially reported seed, fertiliser and chemical companies as having "expressed their reservations on their readiness to supply adequate resources…" ZTV (7/9, 6pm & 8pm), Power FM (7/9, 8pm) and Radio Zimbabwe (8/9, 6am) reported the same companies as now being well prepared to supply adequate inputs for the 2005-6 agricultural season.

However, the government Press did not demonstrate such unprofessional fickleness. They, like the private media, continued to criticise the authorities for the looming agricultural mess. For example, The Herald (8/7) blamed the Ministry of Agriculture for the poor planning saying "we will have ourselves to blame if we get good rains but fail to effectively use our land owing to shortages of inputs".

The candid manner in which both the private and government papers treated the topic was reflected by their voice distribution as shown in Figs 5 and 6.

Both sections of the Press tried to balance official comments with views from the business community, farmers and alternative sources, which all expressed their concerns on the sorry state of affairs in the agricultural sector.

Fig 5 Voice distribution in the government Press

Fig 6 Voice distribution in the private Press

However, the official media compromised their openness in handling the topic by censoring shocking reports on Zimbabwe’s dwindling food supplies by a senior government official. They failed to report the revelations by Permanent Secretary of Agriculture Simon Pazvakavambwa, at the Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries congress, that the country was only left with three weeks’ supply of grain.

This news only appeared in the Independent, The Daily Mirror and Studio 7(10/9).

Studio 7 also carried five reports highlighting the country’s current precarious food situation, including two stories on international aid agencies’ concerns about Zimbabwe’s reluctance to officially seek assistance.

The station (9/9) quoted MDC secretary for agriculture Renson Gasela saying the government was reluctant to disclose "how dangerously low " food supplies had dwindled because "it did not want to discredit land reform". He said government had even lied that the nation had harvested 2.4 million tonnes of maize while simultaneously importing grain secretly because it "wanted to give the impression that land reform was successful and had produced a surplus…"

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