AREX (Agricultural Research and Extension)
AREX is a department that emerged from the merging of the Department of Research and Specialist Services (DR&SS) with the extension and cropping part of AGRITEX,31 following the dismantling of AGRITEX in 2002.
AREX was briefly known as DAREX; until in 2001 it was re-christened AREX.32 Although it underwent many changes its main focus remained on
research and extension. Asked whether the change from AGRITEX to Darex had affected their operations, an AREX officer pointed out that,
Danda (the then deputy director technical of AGRITEX in charge of the reorganisation of AGRITEX in collaboration with a German consultant by the name of Conoley) caused those changes. At that time, we began to work as teams. Each group was composed of five to six people and the group leadership was rotational. He encouraged specialisation: for example, we had a grain specialist, tobacco specialist, livestock specialist (pen fattening) and horticultural specialist. One person would operate over a very large area focusing on his or her area of specialisation. The way we operated became very different. I was now operating from the resettlement areas to Bushu. My area of operation ended at Chevakadzi School. When Danda died, we went back to the old system. Maybe he had observed the system somewhere in Europe where he usually visited but that system was not working here.
You said you used to work here with other officers but now you are all alone: what happened to the others?
AREX is suffering from a critical shortage of staff. Most of the officers went to the Fast Track resettlement because there is a need for trained people to educate the new farmers. I also wanted to go to the Fast Track resettlement but then I realised that I would face accommodation problems.
The government still depends on trained extension workers as a way of disseminating agricultural information to farmers.
Bolding (2004: 82) points out that the overall objective of AGRITEX was ‘to implement the agricultural policy of government through the provision of agricultural technical and extension services, which stimulates the adoption of proven agricultural practices leading to increased, sustained and profitable production’ (see also Mutangadura 1997: 34). True to its stated mission,
30 Note that the categories of people patronising any one institution are not exclu-
sive.
31 For an explanation of the formation of AGRITEX in 1981 see Zawe (2000) and
Bolding (2004).
32 Because of the confusing change of names sometimes I will refer to AREX as
AGRITEX because during the first year of my research the AREX was still known as the AGRITEX. Thus the use of the name will just indicate the time when the data was collected.
AREX (AGRITEX) has been an important mechanism through which technical information regarding agriculture is passed onto farmers. AGRITEX staff played an important role in the dissemination of hybrid maize in the immediate post-Independence period. The role of AGRITEX was to teach farmers to adopt the results of research from agricultural research institutions into their farming practices. Mutangadura (1997: 35) says that in 1989 AGRITEX had a staff component of 2500, of whom 1600 were extension workers, whereas Murwira et al. (2001: 302) estimate the staff component of AGRITEX in 2001 to be 2000, although they do not make it clear how many of these 2000 people were doing the actual exten- sion work.
According to the AREX officers, the role of extension officers has not shifted much with the renaming of the department as AREX.33 Mr Nyama-
haro, an officer in the department of AREX, briefly explained the role of the organisation as follows:
Mostly we play the advisory role. We assist farmers with their operations. For example, we help them in choosing crops, general crop management. We also provide services like soil conservation, water conservation pegging of dams. In general I can say we are into extension.
However, Mr Zawe the Chief Irrigation engineer in the department of irrigation (formerly the irrigation division of AGRITEX but now operating as a department on its own) states that this is a misunderstanding on the part of AREX officers. The change from AGRITEX to AREX was more than just a name change. According to him, the operations of AREX are now limited to research and extension but the practical side of agriculture has to be left to the various practitioners.
For example, the pegging of contours, which was performed by AGRITEX should now be done by the Department of Agricultural enginee- ring (formerly the division of soil and water under AGRITEX). The AREX officer can only inform the relevant department of the need for contours in a certain field but does not peg the contours anymore. For him the confusion is caused by the fact that
After the dismantling of AGRITEX the ground staff did not change from the District level downwards. They did not have workshops to tell the extension workers of the changes. That is the source of the problem. At the moment there is no department that is well established at the district level like AREX. AREX is more prominent on the ground. Some people in the AREX department still think that things are going to go back to the way they were before AGRITEX was
33 For a description of the new roles and functions of AREX and the several depart-
ments emanating from the dismantling of the AGRITEX, see Zawe (forth- coming).
dismantled but that is not going to happen. The changes are advanced but AREX officers can still not understand that someone can just take on their roles, that is, the roles they used to perform when AGRITEX still existed.
AREX is central to the dissemination of knowledge and information in the area. However, as we will see later, AREX is withdrawing from the farmers and the farmers presently do not see AREX playing an important role in the dissemination of knowledge and information. There is also a strong realisation among AREX officers that they do not have anything new to offer farmers.
For the government, agricultural extension officers are an essential component of rural agriculture since they are the ones who are in the field to advise the farmers. AREX is different from all the other institutions in the area because its function is not to make profits but rather to advise and assist where possible. The officers are also always in contact with most of the other institutions in the area because, in order to advise appropriately, they need to know what seed varieties are on the market.
The AREX also holds classes where people are instructed on farming issues. These classes are usually held at Ponesai Vanhu Technical College (a couple of kilometres from Madziva Mines) where other interested parties such as the Forestry Commission and CAMPFIRE also come to teach farmers about soil, tree and animal conservation.
AGRITEX and farmers
Agricultural extension officers employed by AGRITEX perform a number of roles including running periodic courses (including those leading to a Master Farmer’s Certificate), holding field days prior to the planting period, visiting farmers’ fields, and, as described above, liaising with institutions such as Seed Co.
AGRITEX officers impart general knowledge on agriculture through periodic courses of formal lessons for Master Farmer’s certificates and through field days. Women, whether household heads or wives of male heads, usually do not attend the courses because of their high illiteracy rate: none in Mupfurudzi had ever attended the lessons offered by AGRITEX officers. Female household heads do, however, occasionally send their adult sons to attend these courses and pass on the knowledge to their mothers. Also women may informally acquire the information from friends whose husbands do attend.
The relationship between AGRITEX and farmers in these resettlement areas is complex and, at times, contested. Many farmers complain that they can only talk to the AGRITEX officers at village mass meetings. The major grievance against AGRITEX officers is that they do not offer personal attention to individual farmers and that they are thought to offer attention only to the rich farmers, particularly to farmers who grow cash crops. While
the poor were convinced that AGRITEX officers only visited the rich farmers, the better-off farmers were also worried that AGRITEX officers were not doing their job properly. Of the better-off farmers in the Mupfu- rudzi qualitative sample, only one had contacted the AGRITEX officer on an individual basis in the previous year, and this was because he had taken the trouble to invite the officer to his field. Furthermore, at village agricultural meetings, or field days, officers discourage farmers from saving seed and using Open-Pollinated Varieties, although they do advise farmers with regard to saved seed when they cannot afford to buy genuine hybrid seed.
Mrs. Tapfumaneyi (the then acting chief of crops for AGRITEX34) said
that there is no policy governing the activities of field extension officers. There is no stipulated number of times that extension officers are supposed to visit farmers in a day, week, month or year. She said that officers are usually supplied with motorbikes but with very little money for fuel. Some officers use their own fuel with a view to claiming their expenses back but this is such a cumbersome process that many do not bother to do so. Because of a lack of policy, there is no way to judge the performance or non- performance of extension workers. This might lead to some lazy officers not attending to their duties properly. Mrs. Tapfumaneyi said that it was left to individual officers to come up with their own strategies suited to their area of operation. This is somewhat different from the colonial approach to exten- sion staff. Bolding (2004) documents that there was close supervision of extension staff during the colonial era such that any extension worker who was not seen to be doing his work properly or who failed to hold a successful field day would be fired or moved to another area, depending on the circum- stances.
On the contentious issue of whether AGRITEX was carrying out a deliberate policy to concentrate on the good or rich farmers, or on those growing cash crops, Mrs. Tapfumaneyi said recently, this had indeed been the case. She said that in the 1980s the objective of AGRITEX was to bring everyone on board. But it emerged that there were some farmers who had opposed to adopting practices that came with the whites: instead they preferred the traditional way of doing things. These farmers resisted recom- mendations and stuck to the Open-Pollinated Varieties, cattle manure and little crop-spacing. The opposition of some farmers was strengthened by isolated cases of extension officers having relationships with married women. On the other hand, other farmers embraced extension recommen- dations and did very well by way of higher yields, increased livestock and better farming practices. Naturally, a good relationship was established between these farmers and AGRITEX. Occasionally these were the kind of
34 The interview was carried out by Pedzisayi Mangezvo in 2001 for the Inter-
national Food Policy Research Institute project before AGRITEX was dis- mantled.
farmers who attended farmer-training programmes, field days and field observation trials run by AGRITEX. Because of their knowledge about what was going on in the market, these farmers did well and ended up with more income than others.
The current strategy is that farmers growing cash crops are AGRITEX’s first priority. This is reflected in the manner in which the field officers are being deployed. Specialists in paprika, for example, are deployed in areas where the crop is grown or can be grown. The same goes for specialists in tobacco, cotton or grain. The new strategy of prioritising cash-croppers comes in the wake of the realisation by government that smallholder commercial crop production has been neglected over the years. So, indeed, cash-croppers are now considered AGRITEX’s first priority. But even impoverished farmers who are willing to improve themselves are very much part of AGRITEX’s plans. Here, being ‘willing to improve themselves’, means being willing to adopt the ‘expert’ recommended technology packs. As part of its pro-poor approach AREX has also decided to pay more attention to Open-Pollinated Varieties, which many poor farmers tend to favour because of their low production costs; therefore it is part of a government committee addressing this issue.
Although poor farmers applaud the focus on Open-Pollinated Varieties of maize, the shift in AGRITEX priorities, together with the fact that AGRITEX predicted drought in the 1999/2000 season, when in fact there were heavy rains in January and February, combined with the current politi- cal climate, has led to an increasingly mistrustful atmosphere. Some Mupfu- rudzi farmers view the phasing out of the older ‘more reliable’ varieties and replacing them with the newer ‘less reliable’ varieties as a conspiracy between AGRITEX officers, whites and Seed Co to discredit the govern- ment.35 While not everyone trusts AGRITEX officers regarding seed
choices, their expertise is often acknowledged in the case of crop diseases and their control. It is easy to treat a disease when you apply the right chemicals and the results are immediately visible and attributable to the medicine. On the other hand, the climate is unpredictable and could spell disaster for people if the choice of variety was based on an erroneous prediction.
Other factors affecting the ability of AREX to disseminate information include re-organisation, demands placed upon it as a result of Fast Track land reforms, and HIV/AIDS that has resulted in a very high rate of mortal- ity amongst field extension officers.
Seed Co-operative Zimbabwe (Seed Co) and AREX36
Seed Co is the dominant institution involved in the production and marketing of maize seed in Zimbabwe. Its seeds were widely used in the study villages. Seed Co works with AGRITEX/AREX. Seed Co is Zimbabwe’s largest seed producer. It was formed in 1932 and has been involved in seed production since 1940 (Seed Co 2004). Seed Co started with manufacturing an Open- Pollinated Variety in the 1940s and in the 1960s it produced its first hybrid SR52. Seed Co is mainly involved in research such as seed-breeding and it sees its role as producing quality seeds for farmers. Although in its initial stage it focused mostly on maize which was becoming the fastest-growing food and cash crop at the time, Seed Co later moved on to researching other crops such as Soya beans, Wheat, Barley, Groundnuts and Sorghum.
Mrs. Tapfumaneyi, the Acting Chief of Crops for AGRITEX, was very clear on the links between her agency, Seed Co and other seed companies. Information relating to new seed varieties is passed on from seed companies to AGRITEX, whose field officers in turn disseminate the information to the farmers, by word of mouth through field days. The Seed Co-operative informs AGRITEX that a new variety has been bred. After learning of the basic features or characteristics to expect from a crop grown from that seed, AGRITEX carries out ‘field observation trials’. The trials are not carried out at a plot owned by AGRITEX; nor are they conducted prior to marketing the new varieties to the farmers. Field officers run the trials on a piece of land owned by one of the farmers in the community. These on-farm assessments are meant to benefit not only AGRITEX, but also farmers. These trials are used to make area-specific recommendations. For example, when the maize breeders recommend a particular fertiliser, AGRITEX may end up recom- mending manure from cow dung or dried tree leaves (mupfudze). A late- maturing variety in a drought-prone area may lead to AGRITEX recom- mending early planting. A variety that is prone to grain borers such as R201 may lead to AGRITEX recommending the use or non-use of crop rotation. Efforts are made to adapt the new seed technologies to local use, otherwise, according to Mrs Tapfumaneyi, ‘no farmer is going to make use of such technology’. AGRITEX usually relays some feedback to the seed companies but no collaborative research activities are underway or envisaged. The relationship between farmers, AGRITEX and the Seed Co-operative of Zimbabwe indicates that farmers are not consulted on anything but are expected to adopt the products of research wholesale. Even when AGRITEX recommends to suit local conditions, farmers are rarely consulted as AGRITEX recommendations are based on their own scientific knowledge of the agro-ecological zone in which they are stationed.
36 Apart from seed companies, AGRITEX also interacts with chemical and fertili-
ser companies. The nature of interaction varies. With fertiliser companies, it is usually to get a price list for fertilisers.
While seed companies look at the general characteristics of varieties – taste, drought tolerance, storage qualities, trade value, drying rate after harvest, etc., it is the role of AGRITEX to adapt the new seed technologies to local use or to point out to farmers the varieties that are most suitable in different instances. Mrs. Tapfumaneyi mentioned the examples of SC501 and SC513. SC501 is susceptible to grey leaf and the variety is being worked on to address that weakness, which accounts for the development of SC513. Field extension officers are therefore expected to explain to farmers that SC513 is just an improvement of SC501. If one is in an area where grey leaf is not a problem, then one can grow SC501. If one lives in the same area but has a plot with deficiencies that culminate in the grey leaf, then SC513 is the right variety to plant.
Seed availability is not determined by AGRITEX and seed companies do their own marketing through various promotions. Mrs. Tapfumaneyi said that agro-climatic factors account for certain maize varieties being available or not in certain areas. AGRITEX, however, has no particular policy on the availability of seed in different areas. Mrs. Tapfumaneyi commented that AGRITEX has no policy governing Open-Pollinated Varieties (OPV), old varieties and saved seed. She reiterated that the discretion lay with the farmer to pick on a variety best suited to his/her plot. In Mupfurudzi, some farmers claimed that AGRITEX was conniving with seed companies to market ‘bad’ seed, an allegation denied by Mrs. Tapfumaneyi.
GMB (Grain Marketing Board)
In this section, I do not consider the various criticism on the failures of the