Mash East ready to adopt devolution: Minister

MASHONALAND EAST province is ready to adopt the devolution concept and is awaiting support from the national office, Minister of State for Mashonaland East Provincial affairs Cde Apollonia Munzverengwi has said.

Speaking at the Smart Agriculture conference held at Kushinga Phikelela Polytechnic in Marondera on Friday last week, Cde Munzverengwi said the province was already inviting investors to look at opportunities in the agricultural sector.

“Mashonaland East is ready for devolution and all the departments are ready to move. All we are waiting for is support from the national office.

“We want to ensure that our resources benefit the people in this province,” said Minister Munzverengwi.

She said Mashonaland East had the potential to be the leading province in terms of agriculture.

“Mashonaland East is an agricultural based province and we want it to lead in this sector. We want a tobacco sales floor here in Mash East and if our local sales floors are not interested, we will look for investment elsewhere,” he said.

Minister Munzverengi also said smart agriculture would be a buttress for the devolution concept.

“Smart agriculture will help the province to move from a conventional type of farming to the modern technology type of farming.

“Our intention is to create an industrial hub in the province, we want to value add our available farm produce like tomatoes, maize, tobacco, dairy farming into milk products, we also have minerals like lithium in Goromonzi, iron in Hwedza/ Chivhu area, granite in Mutoko area and gold. These will be our pillar for economic development,” she said.

She also urged service providers to create a conducive environment for farmers to produce and enable them to make use of social media platforms when marketing their products.

“Our people are losing a lot of their produce every day because they don’t have access to markets. As service providers you should help our farmers to find markets.

“Devolution is coming and we are going to be the first province to adopt it.”