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Tendai Rupapa Senior Reporter 

FIRST LADY Dr Auxillia Mnangagwa intends to go regional through establishing a cultural exchange programme, complete with festivals and intensive training programmes for youths in the SADC region to bolster family ties and build rock solid and long-lasting relationships.

This will make Dr Mnangagwa a pioneer of cultivating a mixture of different cultures, in a massive show of Africanness.

Presently, there is a rise in inter marriages and disturbing reports that such marital unions were collapsing in no time owing to cultural differences and disagreements over simple things like food.

As part of this initiative, she intends to hold the cultural exchange programme through traditional cooking competitions and Gota/Nhanga/Ixhiba sessions where young boys and girls are armed with information on what is expected of them to ensure they grow into responsible citizens.

The plans come at a time when Dr Mnangagwa’s simple, but well thought-out programmes, are pushing her up the ladder of greatness.

Everything she touches turns into gold.

The mother of the nation, who of late has blazed a trail with her philanthropic works touching lives of many, has a vision to cement the ongoing cultural diversity in a different approach that will go a long way in uniting the region.

Amai Mnangagwa was the toast of the recently held African Elephant Conference in Hwange, where foreign delegates praised her traditional meal cookout festival, among other programmes.

Several environment ministers from the SADC region all but endorsed Dr Mnangagwa’s initiatives, reiterating that they will be taking a leaf from her vision and introducing it to their respective nations.

The First Lady, who is the country’s Environment and Tourism Patron, officially opened the African Elephant Conference where delegates praised her works, including the just-ended traditional meal cookout competition, which they said was of great importance, especially to the tourism sector.

Amai Mnangagwa launched the traditional meal cookout competition in 2020 which ran into 2021 for the finals.

The competition promotes the consumption of indigenous dishes, which were largely being viewed as inferior by younger people who were oblivious of the food’s nutritional and medicinal benefits.

She then handed over the programme to the Ministry of Environment, Tourism and Hospitality Industry.

On Africa Day, the ministry held finals of the 2022 competition, which captured the imagination of guests and foreign dignitaries who expressed desire to replicate the programme in their home countries.

The African-themed finals witnessed the showcasing of innovatively packaged traditional dishes in traditional utensils.

Apart from acknowledging the food’s nutritional and medicinal value, the diplomats agreed that traditional dishes promote good health, create employment and enhance tourists’ experience.

Botswana’s Minister of Environment, Natural Resources Conservation and Tourism Mrs Philda Kereng went a step further during the Conference and spent a significant amount of time praising the First Lady for her initiative.

This comes at a time when most people are shunning traditional dishes in favour of fast foods and exotic meals which expose them to diabetes, hypertension, obesity and cardiovascular diseases, among other illnesses.

“Firstly, I want to take this time and give thanks to the First Lady, Mama Auxillia Mnangagwa, for coming to be with us for the African Elephant Conference as we make deliberations that are going to prepare us for CITES,” she said. 

“The First Lady and the Environment and Tourism Ministry actually hosted on Africa Day celebrations a culinary expo, a showcase of our foods, traditional foods and I know that most of them were prepared from our readily available natural resources, our environmental products promoting nutrition and advancing the value of our African food products that our people can prepare.” 

Minister Kereng described the First Lady’s promotion of indigenous dishes as well thought-out and visionary. 

“Apart from promoting nutrition as an important factor in human life and wellness, this expo also speaks to livelihoods because the women that collect these vegetables and process them and prepare them and package them and sell them are actually going to be living better lives and taking care of their children and families,” she said.

“This is actually creating jobs as well. Our young women and boys enter into the career paths where there are culinary arts. My daughter is a chef herself and I know the passion. So, we are talking about combating unemployment and providing opportunities in employment creation through culinary arts training and career development.” 

The First Lady’s traditional meal cookout competition, Minister Kereng emphasised, augured well for tourism development.

“We are talking about tourism recovery where we are diversifying the tourism product and food is part of it. Something that we can sell that is unique to us. How we prepare our meat, our vegetables, our sadza and all that and we are able to place ourselves in the global space with a unique product that is going to actually give tourists more experience so they can leave more money. 

“It’s no longer about coming to see wildlife and doing our remote drives, game drives and boat cruises, it’s also about the lifestyles. Tourists want to see it, feel it, they want to experience it, they want to stay longer because after Covid-19 the new tourist that is emerging wants more experience, so these expos are more important and I want to encourage the Ministry of Environment and Tourism which took over from Mama (First Lady) to make these bigger. 

“It also speaks to conservation where we are saying that we need to preserve these resources so that they continue providing us with the raw materials for the ingredients that we need. It also speaks to culture because our cultural cooking is our pride as Africans. 

“We are packaging Africa as a destination and also as a destination that can actually break into the global market and provide products that are so unique to this continent,” she said as the whole auditorium nodded in agreement.

At the finals, Dr Mnangagwa said the traditional meal cook-out competition sought to celebrate the goodness of traditional foods and remind people of the health benefits of the same.

“The cookout competition is a platform created by my office and organised by the Ministry of Environment, Tourism and Hospitality Industry working together with its agency the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority (ZTA) and other sister Government Ministries,” she said. 

“This year marks the second edition of the traditional food cookout competition which signifies the role local foods play in promoting local and international tourism, how it promotes good health, livelihoods and its importance as a source of culture preservation.”

Zambia’s Minister of Tourism, Mr Rodney Sikumba, who attended the cooking competition said the traditional meal cookout competition boded well for tourism.

He said his country will follow suit for the benefit of its citizenry.

“It has come at a time when just last weekend back home in Zambia we were witnessing amateur chefs who were trying to become executive chefs in Zambia,” said Mr Sikumba. “These are local Zambians who are trying to claim a certain position in the culinary business. One of the key things I mentioned to them was this particular kind of showcasing is what we call in tourism as gastronomy tourism. 

“The good thing with gastronomy tourism is that as Africans we need to start seeing opportunities and how we can market our own foods. When we invite tourists to come and visit us in Africa we need to showcase the local dishes that we have to offer. We shouldn’t shy away from putting them at the top of our menus to say this is what we have as Africans. As Zambia, we would like to copy this shamelessly.” 

Tanzania’s Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Tourism Mary Masanja hailed Dr Mnangagwa for the programme which she said was of great tourism importance.

“First of all, I want to congratulate you on this occasion,” she said. “Looking at tourism, it is very important because when we show it to the investors and tourists it is of great value. It is best to know our traditional food and how to prepare them and their nutritional benefits. We are proud to see other Africans embracing their traditional foods like we saw here in Zimbabwe.”

Namibia Deputy Minister of Environment, Forests and Tourism Heather Mwiza Sibungo said the cook-out competition taught them to be proud of what “we have as Africa.”

“The First Lady of Zimbabwe did a really good thing by coming up with this initiative. This is a good idea that I need to also share with my First Lady at home,” she said.

The buzz which the traditional meal cookout competition created and the many positive comments it elicited from dignitaries point to the seriousness with which Dr Mnangagwa approaches her work in a quest to boost the welfare of the country’s citizenry.