Urban Dwellers in Southern Africa Turn to Backyard Farming
“I spend most of my maize yields to my relatives in my village in Mberengwa because they always have droughts,” Gono told IDN.
By Jeffrey Moyo
IDN
November 2022
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HARARE, Zimbabwe (IDN) — At unoccupied swathes of land behind houses in Bloomingdale, a medium-income suburb in the Zimbabwean capital Harare, numerous maize fields and vegetable gardens have emerged as urban dwellers enduring economic hardships switch to backyard farming.
Zambia, despite emerging from an economic crisis during former President Edgar Lungu’s reign that ended last year, has dozens of urban dwellers taking up agriculture to supplement their earnings.
The same goes for Mozambicans east of Zimbabwe, who have scrambled for every vacant piece of land across towns and cities in the coastal nation.
Not to be outdone, Malawi, located north of Zimbabwe, has urban agriculture becoming a way of life.
In fact, as many Southern Africans contend with inflation and food deficits, hordes of urban dwellers across the region are fast switching to farming in their backyards.
All across the region, the media has been awash with reports of industries shutting down over the past decades, leaving many rural migrants to the cities and towns stranded.
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