Farmers are joining together to heal land that has been depleted from overgrazing and thereby improving their food and nutrition security. With the help of TSURO Trust, a member of PELUM Zimbabwe, farmers are caring for their livestock in one or more community herds that are collectively managed according to rules that maximize benefits and sustainability.
Stembile Bofu (52) is one of the 27 farmers who have been collectively herding cattle in Chisikaurai village, Chimanimani district since 2012. Stembile describes how the community herd of 620 cattle is managed to protect the land in her community:
“During the day, the cattle are grazing in designated areas and each time they are with herders to prevent them from wandering and overgrazing. At night, the cattle are placed in an enclosure. We identify areas that need to be healed, then we enclose the cattle overnight for up to seven days before we move the enclosure.”
Stembile also explains how she uses the cattle to enrich the soil of her crop field. “We call this process ‘’animal impacting’’ because we are using the hoofs of cattle to break hard capped soils. The cattle then deposit their dung and urine into the soil,” says Stembile.
Tokwenya village in Chimanimani district is also practicing collective herding, planned grazing and animal impacting. Mejury Rugotwi (42), one of the Tokwenya farmers is very happy with the results:
“I have increased my yields and herding cattle collectively has helped me to improve the breed of my cattle. I did not have access to a bull but putting my cattle in one herd has enabled me to have access to good bulls. I am also getting milk from my cattle which I sell to earn some income. This has greatly improved my livelihood.”
Collective herding has improved animal fertility, health and safety according to Farai Gumisai (38), who is the TSURO Trust field officer working with small-scale farmers in Chimanimani district:
“The calving rate for livestock in the collective herd has also increased tremendously. Herding livestock collectively has also reduced cattle mortality rates and incidents of theft. This is benefiting the community because livestock owners are also getting more milk and meat from the cattle. Some farmers sell milk and meat to earn funds which they use to pay school fees for their children.”
Farai explains that it is not easy to get all the farmers in a village to agree to put their livestock into one or more community herds that are managed according to a plan. “We faced a challenge of low adoption of the project by the community as many people would want to see the benefits first before venturing into the project,” says Farai. Farmers are provided with information about land and livestock management and other technical assistance by TSURO Trust. In addition, farmers are given Boma sheets made of PVC plastic to use as mobile enclosures that protect livestock from predators.
As more farmers join the programme and depleted land heals from overgrazing, other kinds of problems can arise, according to Farai: “Non participating farmers are in the habit of poaching grass in paddocks that are being managed by farmers participating in the landscape regeneration programme.” Once these issues are resolved and all the farmers agree to cooperate in collective herding, the whole community enjoys the benefits.
Agreeing to coordinate their use of grazing land enables the farmers to avoid the “tragedy of the commons,” a term used by economists and environmentalists to describe sustainability problems. When individuals make use of collective commons such as grazing land according to self-interest, their uncoordinated actions can cause depletion of that resource. To solve the problem of overgrazing and depleted land, the farmers are now working together as a community, which will give sustainable benefits to them all.
By managing their livestock according to a plan, the farmers are achieving sustainability and mitigating the impacts of climate change, according to Farai:
“Some tree species are emerging, dry springs and rivers are being restored back to health, and soils are enriched at low cost using organic matter which is easily available among farmers. In the next two years I see communities in Chimanimani district increasing their food and nutrition security. More and more people will be eating and buying locally produced food grown in healthy soils which are kept alive by properly managed livestock.”
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