Agriculture Reporter
Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development Minister Joseph Made, recently met the Israeli ambassador for Africa, Mr Dan Shaham, to discuss ways of boosting the irrigation sector.

Minister Made said the revival of the irrigation sector was expected to boost the capacity of smallholder farmers.
He said the two parties have been working together in the agriculture sector and this led to the establishment of several institutions related to the irrigation sector.

These include the Irrigation Centre at the Institute of Agriculture Engineering and Mechanisation among others.
“The ambassador visited the Irrigation Centre on Tuesday and has seen the state-of-the-art machinery. We have agreed to re-establish the Irrigation Centre, which is very important in training personnel from Mozambique, Zambia and Malawi among other Southern African countries,” said Minister Made.

He said a regional irrigation company, Netafim, would also help the centre through the replacement of computers at the institution.
“We are grateful to experts who are going to work with a local irrigation company, Pedstock, in irrigation re-establishment,” said Minister Made.
The two parties will sign a Memorandum of Understanding soon, which is being drafted. The signing of other agreements at business level will follow the MoU. The meeting also discussed other areas of development and co-operation in the agriculture sector, including mechanisation.

“Israel is a leader in uplifting smallholder farmers from subsistence to commercial level and we are going to use the same system,” said Minister Made. “We are also interested in phytosanitary matters.”

Minister Made said although irrigation development was important, there was need to look at plant and animal diseases that may come with it. Zimbabwe and Israel will also co-operate in the control of animal diseases.

“Israel leads in dairy production and has worked in China, Kenya and Botswana,” said Minister Made.
“We are happy that we are going to strengthen the capacity of our scientists in extension, training and research.”

Ambassador Shaham said the meeting was fruitful. “We have reached a concrete level. We spoke to professionals and got suggestions on how we can help the small holder farmers through irrigation system,” he said.