Martin Muleya
Environment Management Agency (EMA) in conjunction with Global Environment Facility (GEF) 7 is rolling out dryland sustainable landscapes impact programme in three districts in Manicaland Province, with a view to preserve land as well as forest management.
The programme also dubbed: Integrated land use planning is being implemented in Chimanimani, Chipinge and Buhera districts.
The project is a pilot within dry landscapes for other districts to learn. EMA intends to use a tool kit so as to increase land productivity, reduce land cover and degradation.
Speaking during the inception meeting of an Integrated land use planning workshop with Government stakeholders in Mutare last week, GEF7 national coordinator Precious Magwaza said the thrust of the project was to support a transformational shift towards a sustainable and integrated management of multi-use dryland landscapes of the Miombo and Mopani ecoregions.
“This project is being implemented in Save and Runde catchment areas which are dry land areas. The project focuses on sustainable land, forest management as well as improving community livelihoods. It is being implemented by EMA as the executing entity and it commenced in 2021,” highlighted Magwaza.
EMA education and publicity manager Amkela Sidange said through this programme EMA and other stakeholders will ensure that land degradation is reduced by restoring all the affected areas in the three districts.
“In a way we expect all land with degradation to be restored. We are in the United Nations (UN) ecosystem decade of restoration so we expect communities to plant trees so as to achieve what we want. By improving land productivity, it will ensure that communities will produce more and become food secure, explained Sidange
Asked whether the project will stop climate change migration, Sidange said that in the project there is issue of reducing greenhouse emission which in a way will reduce emission of gas by 2030.
“We have our targets of reducing the emission of greenhouse gas by 2030. So when we look at both landscapes having a uniform scenario, we won’t have that migration. If you look closely all the things causing human-wildlife conflict there are coming out as a result of climate change that has brought an imbalance in the food system hence a lot of migration as people move to areas that still produce more.
“So, if we are to restore lands that are degraded we will be treating that equilibrium such that there is no movement from one area to another because from both landscapes people will be economically secure and the animals will be able to roam around freely,” she added.
