Martin Muleya
CHIMANIMANI-The Minister of Environment, Climate and Wildlife Evelyn Ndlovu has commended catchment management works at Nenhohwe in Chimanimani District.
Minister Ndlovu also applauded the local community for complementing government efforts to restore degraded landscapes in an area highly vulnerable to recurrent droughts, severe soil erosion, declining soil fertility and widespread land degradation.
Addressing villagers at Nenhohwe yesterday, Ndlovu said her ministry was being guided by the national and catchment-level Land Degradation Neutrality framework, a science-based planning process that identified Nenhohwe as a critical site for targeted interventions.
“We have seen the culture of togetherness being cultivated here at Nenhohwe. As government we are happy that we managed to address a challenge that you had been facing as a community,” Ndlovu said.
She said the GEF 7 project being celebrated was a cross-sector approach supporting the mainstreaming of sustainable forest and land management to enhance ecosystem resilience for improved livelihoods.
Ndlovu said through a participatory process, the project supported the development of a Ward Environmental Plan and an Integrated Land Use Plan for the ward. The plans were implemented by the community under the leadership of a functioning Environmental Sub-Committee responsible for tracking restoration progress and strengthening local environmental governance.
“Today the initiative has mobilized 360 community members, reflecting the project’s strong commitment to inclusive and gender-responsive landscape restoration, Nenhohwe has demonstrated that successful landscape restoration is achieved with strong community ownership and active stakeholder involvement,” she added.
Speaking at the same occasion, Environmental Management Agency (EMA) provincial manager Rambai Mapako said empowering local institutions to lead restoration efforts was restoring degraded ecosystems and strengthening climate resilience.
“In our engagement with local communities we came in as technical experts and partnered with communities who spearheaded the whole program in terms of implementation. The Nenhohwe gulley reclamation is a testimony of communities mobilizing themselves and working with partners to address an environmental challenge that has been threatening their cultural site,” Mapako said.
He said the works formed part of broader catchment management where 300ha had been protected through upstream interventions.
“With ecosystem restoration we identify land that has been degraded and we intervene through gulley reclamation. The next stage is stabilizing the soils by taking soil samples to understand the chemical composition and identify the appropriate chemicals we can apply to improve the soil structure,” Mapako highlighted.
Local villager and Integrated Land Use Plan project leader Queen Chemoyo said the community worked with traditional leadership to mobilize 365 people to work voluntarily to improve their ward.
“We sat down as a community taking note of the damage that had characterized our ward. The site we chose for gulley reclamation was a burial site for our departed relatives and we worked with partners such as Forestry Commission, World Vision, EMA, among others,” Chemoyo explained.
The GEF 7 project is part of government efforts to upscale catchment rehabilitation in drought prone districts as part of Zimbabwe’s commitment to Land Degradation Neutrality and climate adaptation.
