By VANWICK ZULU
SOUTHERN Province Principal Agricultural Officer Valentine Kilubi has commended the Sustainable Intensification of Smallholder Farming Systems (SIFAZ) Project in Zambia for its effort in championing Sustainable Intensification Practices that would respond to farmer challenges.
Speaking during the Provincial Cluster review meeting for SIFAZ, which is European Union-funded, Mr Kilubi said food security is the most important objective that the Ministry of Agriculture is trying to achieve which has been affected by climate change.
SIFAZ supports the Ministry achieve objective to ensure there’s food security in the country. With climate change challenges that have threatened stability, SIFAZ comes in handy as it is trying to champion practices that would increase the yields in the nation.
“When I look at the various things that SIFAZ wants to achieve, I see that these practices have been there for a long time and our parents used to practice these practices that we are trying to revive through the SIFAZ project and there was a reason why our parents used to do that; to increase their yields and to have nutritious food to eat,” Mr Kilubi said.
He stated that previously, people might not have had the basic understanding of research or a full grasp of the benefits of intensifying production or incorporating agroforestry.
“But this is more important now that we are in the climate change era because we are not guaranteed of a better yield, the soils have been mined like here in Southern Province, we have been seeing farmers moving to other areas in search of better soils and better rainfall,” Mr Kilubi cautioned.
He, however, wondered whether there were statistics to show the rate of adoption for these technologies among the smallholder farmers.
“SIFAZ is trying to improve the soils, improve our yields and also mechanize our farming practices to sustain the food security for our nation, but there is a challenge when I look at these practices, how is the adoption rate? We have been implementing SIFAZ since 2019. If we are to assess, how is the adoption, what factors are increasing adoption, if it is increasing and what factors are affecting adoption if at all there is low adoption?” Mr Kilubi wondered.
He urged the implementers of the Project to examine these questions as this will assist Government even when SIFAZ comes to an end, the lessons drawn from this can be championed in other projects.
Mr Kilubi officially opened a three-day cluster meeting where the Monitoring and Evaluation team have met to review the project implementation. The SIFAZ Project ends in 2027, a 7.5year project funded by the EU and is implemented by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations (UN) in collaboration with The Ministry of Agriculture and the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT). –NAIS
