THE Dry Land Sustainable Landscapes Impact Program, in short, the DSLIP, focusing on sustainable land management and sustainable forest management has adopted a deliberate policy to empower marginalised groups in Zimbabwe.
Zimbabwe is one of the Southern African countries implementing the project which seeks to restore degraded lands.
Maricho Magazine Editor, Conrad Mwanawashe (CM), had a conversation with Precious Magwaza (PM), the National Project Coordinator for the Dry Land Sustainable Landscapes Impact Program, at Tongogara Refugee Settlement in Chipinge on the sidelines of the World Food Day.
PM: As a project we are responding to a program that we are calling the Land Degradation Neutrality Target Setting Program, which was done under the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification. So, Zimbabwe as a party to the convention set land restoration targets.
The project is coming in a very big way to assist the country in achieving those targets. The project is funded through the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations by GEF, the Global Environment Facility.
Editor’s intervention notes: The DSL-IP in numbers
According to FAO, with USD104 million funding under the Global Environment Facility (GEF) -7 funding circle, along with over 800 million co-financing, the Sustainable Forest Management Impact Program on Dryland Sustainable Landscapes aims to move the needle on Global Environmental Benefits (GEBs), and is assisting 11 countries across Africa and Asia in:
a) fostering resilience of production systems in drylands;
b) promoting restoration and rehabilitation; and
c) improving livelihoods through a comprehensive landscape approach.
PM: The executing entity is the Environmental Management Agency, which houses the PMU. As partners to the project, we have the Community Technology Development Organisation (CTDO), that is responsible for mainstreaming sustainable land management in crop production and rangeland management.
We also have EMA as a partner again, implementing components on catchment management, that is the gully restoration, the removal of invasive alien species and the wildfire management. There’s another partnership with Forestry Commission.
Forestry Commission’s interest is sustainable forest management, that is managing the woodlands in the country, or rather in the Save and Runde catchments where the project is being implemented. They are also establishing woodlots.
The bigger component of the project that is being run by World Vision promotes business development among farmers.
You realize that the reason why the land is degraded is because people want livelihoods and World Vision is coming in to support the business component.
In the Save and Runde catchments we’ve identified community groups that are into various livelihood projects and our major focus is:
(i) non-timber forest products;
(ii) the small livestock and
(iii) the traditional grain.
“We’re assessing these producer organizations and building their capacity to run viable businesses.
It’s not only ending at the capacity building as training, but also providing equipment so they can process traditional grain and all of these products that I’ve spoken to.
In doing all of these businesses, we’re mainstreaming sustainable land management and sustainable forest management.
CM: What are some of the milestones and some of the challenges that you have encountered during the implementation of the project?
PM: This project is being implemented under three components:
The first component is focusing on building an enabling environment for sustainable land and forest management. As our entry point, we focused on the land use plans, to say, how do we bring in all key stakeholders in managing the land? And then we’re developing land use plans for both Save and the Runde catchments.
Again, to buttress whatever interventions that we’re doing as a project, we’re also focusing on the policy component to scan on the by-laws that are already existing or policy gaps and we’re strengthening that.
The second component, like I said earlier, we’ve identified groups and organizations that are across the landscape, and we have over 20 groups that we’re working with and we’re training them on business development.
Then under the agriculture component, working with CTDO, we’ve established farmer field schools and we’ve done about 600 farmer field schools across the eight districts in which we’re implementing the project.
Farmer field schools are schools without walls where communities are coming together as groups of about 25 and they’re sharing their knowledge on sustainable land management in croplands.
CM: What do you think could have been done differently?
PM: A barrier which was identified as we were developing this project was the silo mentality where each institution is doing the activities in their small space. So as a project, we’re working in a very big way to bring everyone together, so that there is coordination and collaboration as we do things.
We have set up committees from the national level down to the provincial and the district levels.
And also riding on existing committees to strengthen their capacity and ensure that they work together.
So maybe in terms of the challenges that we have faced, you realize that because of issues around poverty, climate change, it’s difficult to get communities to really engage in land management and forest management activities.
Because for them, what is of interest is what’s in it for me. We’ve been trying to look around to say, so how do we incentivize communities to participate in these activities?
And if you realize in terms of our interventions, we are layering them in such a way that there is something for them in every intervention that we do.
CM: How does it work in terms of funding for the project?
PM: In terms of funding, we’re worth US$10 million that has come from the Global Environment Facility through FAO. All of this money is distributed across the partners that I mentioned earlier, EMA, Forestry Commission, World Vision, CTDO and Zimparks.
The project is running for five years. Officially, it was supposed to have started in 2021 November, ending in September 2026 but as you are aware, there were delays due to COVID.
However, we have an acceleration plan to make sure we push the project and we end it September 2026 and everything is done.
CM: May you comment on the participation of women in the project?
PM: As part of the objectives of the project, we reach out to 52% of our beneficiaries being women. We have a gender officer for the project who is looking into gender issues.
We first did a baseline to scan the current environment and we developed a gender action plan that says, so how do we integrate gender into all of the activities that we’re implementing in the project?
Also, 35% of the households we’re targeting are women-headed. We have that deliberate target to ensure that there is inclusion of women, youth, people with disabilities and the elderly.
As a project, we also appreciate that people living in poverty are more affected by degradation than everyone else. That’s why then we’ve thought of an inclusive approach in doing business.
