Livestock Rejuvenates Ecosystem

Case Study

Ncube, E. (2016) Livestock Rejuvenates Ecosystem. PELUM Zimbabwe – Networking for a Greener Africa

Key Takeaways

Elias Ncube, an accredited Holistic Management educator at the Africa Centre for Holistic Management (ACHM) in Zimbabwe, offers his perspective on how Holistic Planned Grazing is helping local smallholder farmers.
The communal curriculum of Holistic Management, known as Holistic Land and Livestock Management (HLLM), has been adopted not just at ACHM but also in neighoring communities.
Another case study in this PDF discusses a local woman who adopted Holistic Planned Grazing with great sucess. "Ester used to harvest six or seven 50 kg of maize. After animal impacting she harvested 16 x 50 kg of maize in 2014 and 17 x 50kg of maize in 2015. In 2016, a devastating drought ravaged the country, but Ester still managed to harvest 12 x 50kg of maize."

Summary

Smallholder farmers in many parts of Africa face numerous challenges such as desertification, drying rivers and wells, poverty, increasing spread of infectious diseases, crop failures and dwindling livestock. Women who constitute the majority of smallholder farmers suffer the most.

Although the challenges they face seem insurmountable, pioneering work in Holistic Land and Livestock Management (HLLM) is offering hope.