… existing potential untapped
ONGWEDIVA – The Kunene Region is one of a few regions in Namibia blessed with abundant natural resources and has the potential to produce enough food to feed the region and the nation.
Apart from the Kunene River and its extensive reach across a large part of the region through its streams and tributaries, the region also has fertile land, suitable for both irrigation and animal farming. However, this northern region with its vast and untaped natural resources is in a dire need of food with close to 80 percent of the population registered for drought relief aid in the form of food.
While the governor of the region Joshua //Hoebeb agrees that the region should strive for self-sufficiency in food production, what is required is a padigm shift in the traditional ways of thinking in order to embrace crop production and irrigation.
"The people of the Kunene are not crop farmers – they do not have a tradition or culture of cultivation and irrigation, they are semi-nomadic livestock pastoralists. There has been resistance in the past since cultivation is not part of our people's culture, but we can overcome resistance. We just need to have a Moses (biblical Moses) to turn the situation around. We do not have a Nile River here, but we have a Kunene River – and I know that this region can be self-sufficient in food production," said //Hoebeb.
The governor maintains that the region only needs help from local or or international experts to establish sedentary agricultural projects. He further added that the region needs to benchmark with other regions such as Kavango and Caprivi to see how they came up with major projects and how they are managing them. The Caprivi, Kavango, Hardap and Karas regions have major irrigation projects such as the Kalimbeza rice project, the Ndonga Linena project, the Hardap irrigation scheme and the grape irrigation scheme at Aussenkehr.
The Omusati Region, which does not have a river, but is fortunate to be situated near the Calueque-Oshakati water canal produces maize at the Etunda irrigation project, which is supplied to other regions including the Kunene Region. Apart from major government projects in the five regions small-scale farmers also produce great quantities of fresh produce and supply supermarkets, schools and at times export some of their produce such as fresh maize, tomatoes, butternuts, watermelons, sweet potatoes and onions among others to neighbouring Angola.
The same cannot be said for the Kunene Region where a total of 50 people, mostly children were admitted to various hospitals in the region not too long ago due to malnutrition, which is a condition that occurs when one’s body does not get enough nutrients. Eight people succumbed to the condition. The region has a population of 88 000 people of whom close to 70 000 are currently registered to receive drought relief food. The registered people do not include the urban poor and other vulnerable groups.
//Hoebeb said the people of the region basically survive on milk and meat, which is not a healthy or balanced diet. Dudu Murorua who is the chairperson of the management committee of the Kunene Regional Council on the other hand maintains that with good strategies in place and support from government, the people of the Kunene can produce food on their own.
"We don't need an investor, we want our people to help themselves. All we need is establishing proper irrigation schemes so that communities can produce and sell their produce locally, before they sell outside the region," said Murorua. He said at the moment the region has a number of small-scale farmers in seven areas, including Okaoko-Otavi, Fransfontein, Sesfontein and Khowareb among others "but they are not driven by economies of scale”.
Her added: “The people who are running these projects are struggling on their own. I recently asked the Deputy Prime Minister [Marco Hausiku] to convince the minister of agriculture [John Mutorwa] to help these small projects," said Murorua.