Bindura farmers in Mashonaland Central have cried foul over the prolonged dry spell that the country is currently experiencing, fearing that they might harvest very little this farming season.
Bindura farmers are fearing drought and hunger next year, as the country have received very little rains ever since the beginning of this year’s season.
In an interview, Chairman of the Bindura Farmers Association Mr Rodwell Choto has expressed concern over the negative effects that the dry spell might have on the economy of the country.
“I don’t want to lie, the rains are already late and even if they come today we fear that we might have no bumper harvest next year.
“We fear for the farmers who had already borrowed inputs from CBZ bank, they might not harvest enough to pay back to the bank. This is a tough time.” He said.
Mr Choto however urged his fellow farmers to resort to traditional grains that are adoptive to climate change in the future so that when drought comes, they will still harvest big.
“I would like to encourage farmers to focus more on traditional grains in the future and not on seasonal varieties so that they won’t lose much.”
Meanwhile, we caught up with one Bindura farmer, Mr Simbarashe Gomwe who lamented and feared for the future of Bindura farmers.
“We farmers have been affected adversely by this dry spell that we are experiencing this year. with the excessive rains that we received last year, we were hoping that this year was a good year as well.
“Right now we should have crops right on the ground but right now we are still stuck. We have done our leg preparation and this will force us to abandon the long season of varieties which have got the potential of yielding highly because our summer season is going to be shortened by this dry spell so our profitability is going to be affected big time.” Mr Gomwe said.
Today the country woke up to a few clouds in the sky and farmers are hopeful that it might rain this week but the rain will not do much to damage control as most of the crops in Bindura are already dried up.
Most Bindura farmers are beneficiaries of the Presidential pfumvudza/ Intwasa scheme under which farmers are provided with farming inputs.