Identification of a support programme for land reform in Zimbabwe : Mission of identification financed by the Ministry of foreign affairs and Agence française de développement. Harare, Zimbabwe, from 3 to 11 November 1998

The Govemment of Zimbabwe is undertaking the second phase of land reform that began in 1980. Following the conference between the Government and the donor agencies, the former are identifying projects to support land reform. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Agence Française de Developpement have identified a programme of geographical and thematically limited nature. The programme would be centred on rural development mainly in the District of Guruve, benefiting from the support of the current project financed by the French Global Environment Facility, and on feasibility projects already identified in Central Mashonaland. This involves giving support in the setting up of small farmers benefiting from land reform in the following cases: communal areas, forest margins (extension of cotton), areas on farms bought back by the State, irrigation areas with private sector intervention. The investment section and the feasibility study would be financed by AFD. The long-term agricultural section (new techniques of the Doubly Green Revolutions and fodder intensification) would be presented for financing to the French Fund for World Environment. Private French aid would also be sought. The MAE could finance the monitoring and evaluation system of a certain number of typical cases of setting up of farmers. The activities will include local innovative experiments, analyses and proposals concerning techniques of land planning, follow-up research on land, agricultural, ecological, environmental, social, economic and financial planning techniques. These analyses, as well as an economic and financial model measuring the impacts of the reforms, could be used in the studies of national institutions that are in charge of Land Reform. The monitoring and evaluation would be carried out in co-operation with different Zimbabwean University teamns with which relations already exist within the framework of current projects. (Résumé d'auteur