US govt avails US$130m to Zim

LIVINGSTONE MARUFU

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has availed US$130m to Zimbabwe which will go towards supporting resilience programmes in the next five years.

Speaking to Business Times on the sidelines of the Lean Season Assistance programme in Nyamhondoro Primary School in Mudzi district last week, USAID Humanitarian Assistance and Resilience deputy director Ahmadou NDiade said people will receive double portions for February and March to pave way for other programmes

“The humanitarian agency has two mandates which are to respond to the emergency of food insecurity and climate change as well as development programmes which include attending to chronic issues like malnutrition and improving agriculture activities.

“We have long-term programmes which include the US$55m scheme with Care International in response to chronic issues. We also have another US$75m programme with Cultivating New Frontiers in Agriculture in Matabeleland North where we are tackling developmental programmes.

“These resilience programmes help to improve production, utilise land and provide people with boreholes and water so that they can be more resilient in their communities,” NDiade said.

He said there was a need to attend to the emergency food needs in areas like Mudzi which are vulnerable to erratic rainfall patterns despite the need to build resilience and capacities in communities.

Recently, Zimbabwe received US$36.7m from the US government which supported more than 700 000  food-insecure people in eight districts.

The lean season assistance was by the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) in Buhera, Hwedza, Mudzi, Bikita, Chivi, Nkayi, Mangwe and Mount Darwin districts.

“We are the ones who are providing the funds to WFP to implement these lean season activities through World Vision and its partners.

“This year we have funded WFP to the tune of US$36.7m to respond to the insecurity lean season activity. The reason we are here today is to see how the distribution is occurring and lessons that can be drawn from the event,” he said.

The food agencies told the multitudes in Mudzi that they were done for the lean season and shall resume operations in October this year.

WFP country director Francesca Erdelmann said the programme is likely not going to continue as the resources budgeted for are close to an end.

“We have to mobilise our resources ahead of time as we were getting around 92% from USAID and a complementary from the Japanese and German governments.

“There is a need to decide before October on how much we need to purchase for the lean season. For us it is very difficult to go bigger or to change the programmes halfway,” Erdelmann said.

“We have only the budgeted resources, therefore, it is quite tough for us to extend the lean period,” she said.

“We are hearing this request for the first time and we have already done our budgets.

“For the USAID to extend the programme we have to sit down with WFP and the funders hierarchy but resources are allocated in advance as we had budgeted this in October 2022.

“For this to be extended there is a need for another allocation,” he said.

Speaking at the same event, Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare minister Paul Mavima said the people of Mudzi have to remove the dependency syndrome and stand on their own in terms of food security.

“Scaling up food distribution is not an objective for programmes like these as under normal circumstances we hope we will scale down since people have produced their food.

“That is our goal in the long run. All will depend upon assessments that are done with the Lands ministry,” Mavima said.