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Agriculture and food security
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
Weekly Media Update 2005-42
Monday October 31^st – Sunday November 6^th 2005

IN a rare display of unison this week both sections of the Press agreed on the country’s poor preparations for the 2005/6 farming season and its potential to further impair the current precarious food situation. The papers carried 44 stories on the topic, 23 of which were in the government Press and the remaining 21 in the private papers.

The government Press’ refreshing candidness was summed up by The Herald (1/11), which carried startling revelations by Deputy Minister of Agriculture, Sylvester Nguni, attributing the decline in agricultural production to government’s skewed land reform policies.

Nguni deflated the official argument blaming farming problems on drought saying: "Granted, drought has taken its toll on production, but the biggest letdown has been that people without the faintest idea of farming got the land…" The deputy minister was unimpressed by government’s maize producer price, saying the problem facing the government and industry was their failure to tell the truth "when it came to matters afflicting agriculture". For example, said Nguni, "the truth" is that the maize price of $2.2 million per tonne is not "very attractive" as it is incompatible with production costs, adding, "Even if we did not have a drought we were still going to import as farmers turn to more lucrative crops – and this is the truth."

On the relevance of government’s land audits, Nguni scoffed at their composition, saying "surely nothing" can come out of them when the "same officers who bungled land allocations are the ones we send to do the auditing".

However, The Herald (2/11) compromised its openness on Nguni’s statements by failing to reconcile his comments with those of his boss, Agriculture Minister Joseph Made, whom it reported telling the same farmers that the fall in agricultural output had been "caused by a combination of drought and illegal sanctions imposed by Britain and its allies".

ZBH ignored these issues in the 34 stories it carried highlighting chaos in the agricultural sector. Although the broadcaster carried reports that showed farmers’ failure to obtain adequate inputs, it tried to downplay such realities with news that portrayed the authorities as working tirelessly to boost production.

For example, Radio Zimbabwe & Power FM (3/11,1pm) and ZTV (3/11, 8pm) passively announced that the central bank had allocated $500 billion for soya bean production without explaining whether this was enough to revive the sector. Neither did they attempt to measure the impact of such funding on production.

It was against such blind coverage of government’s purported efforts to resuscitate the agricultural sector that saw the broadcaster carrying contradictory reports on the availability of inputs. For instance, while Power FM and ZTV (4/11, morning bulletins) reported that seed houses have "enough seeds for the season", it revealed in the same breath that seed manufacturers had distributed only 400 tonnes to the Grain Marketing Board out of the required
13 000 tonnes.

But the private media was more forthright in their coverage of problems in the agricultural sector. The Financial Gazette (3/11), for example, revealed that the government-run Agricultural and Rural Development Authority (ARDA), which "muscled" its way onto Kondozi Farm last year, had lost the "lucrative export markets" the government hoped to inherit from the farm’s former owners. The Zimbabwe Independent (4/11) reported that because of ARDA’s failure to produce, government would be signing an agricultural agreement with China aimed at "reviving several derelict former white farms" the authority had confiscated and "boost agricultural production".

The private Press also carried two stories on new farm invasions and one report on a farm ownership wrangle between ZANU PF national chairman John Nkomo and businessman Langton Masunda over a hunting concession in Gwayi’s Lugo ranch.

In addition, the Independent, The Standard and Studio 7 (3 & 5/11) reported on the country’s perilous food situation.

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