THE farm Mechanisation Programme initiated
Equally the ruling Party has no apologies to make for the Land Reform exercise as it successfully resettled over 360 000 households under the A1 and A2 schemes. Many men and women were killed and maimed while fighting to free the country from colonial rule which had made the indigenes of this country displaced to unfertile reserves.
In a statement ZANU PF acting Secretary for Information, Publicity and National Spokesperson Cde Patrick Chinamasa, said efforts
“”The Farm Mechanisation Programme was undertaken as an empowerment tool for the farmers and was not a loan but a subsidy. The allegation
“They are a direct attack on the building initiatives for new farmers
Cde Chinamasa said the stance taken
He said support extended to farmers
“Governments the world over subsidizes farmers. The key ingredient in agricultural policies the world over, is to produce food and raw materials to feed into the manufacturing sector more cheaply,” Cde Chinamasa said.
“Programmes of subsidy include mechanisation, fertilisers, farm infrastructure such as irrigation. This is a major policy in most countries including China, USA, Russia, India etc. Zimbabwe should not be an exception more so, in an evolving situation where the country has a new crop of farmers previously discriminated against.”