Project News

ZIM-SHEP Team conducted baseline survey from June to August 2021 in Mashonaland East and Manicaland province. The survey was conducted in strict observance of Covid-19 regulations. To adhere to the regulations, the team limited the size of sub-groups per extension officer administering questionnaires to 5 or 6 farmer respondents.

Feedback from participant farmers was positive and included statements like, "We have been told the importance of record keeping for many times, but today, we understood why we need to keep records and what we have to note on the record. In the past, we did not remember the cost of inputs, labour hours per activity, unit price of products and even total amount of production".

From this survey, the project decided to collect data on "Farming as Business" which includes the relationships among market actors, family members and farmers in the same irrigation schemes in addition to income data and adopted recommended agricultural practices.

This is to enable the team to capture changes in farmer behaviours which would help us evaluate our achievements better in case we fail to collect accurate income data due to inflation.

The results of the survey will assist the team to identify the training needs of each irrigation scheme and plan forthcoming activities to improve farmers' production, productivity and profitability.

An extension officer explains the question to farmers

An extension officer explains the questions to farmers

Farmers filling up the questionnaire

A couple filling up the questionnaire