Hera Lal Nath has been working as a field office coordinator with CIMMYT in Bangladesh since 2015 through participatory and adaptive research for the development of farm communities. He has been involved with several projects focusing on sustainable agrifood system development in partnership with different private and public organizations. He leads a regional team aiming to address mechanization issues with a focus on market base machine innovation, including low-tech solutions of agriculture applications and increasing access to machineries services.
Nath has experience with different international organizations and the UN, where he also led multi-disciplinary and multi-cultural teams in different geographical contexts to heighten farmer knowledge and improve livelihoods. As agroecosystems and food security is an enduring process, Nath always concentrates on todayâs issues that may provide solutions to yesterday or tomorrowâs problems.
Masud Rana is a Monitoring Evaluation and Learning Officer working with CIMMYTâs Sustainable Agrifood Systems (SAS) program based in Bangladesh. He is currently working for the Cereal Systems Initiatives for South Asia (CSISA) project.
Lokendra Khadka is a Research associate in the Sustainable Agrifood Systems (SAS) program in Nepal. He currently focuses on scaling inclusive and sustainable irrigation technologies in coordination with the public and private sector.
Lokendra’s research expertise expands from resource conservation technologies related to cereal based cropping systems to scale-appropriate farm mechanization and irrigation.
Sagar has been working at CIMMYT-Nepal since December 2015, contributing to various projects. His main focus has been on the CSISA initiative, which aims to research and scale up resource-saving technologies within Nepal’s cereal systems. Through his work, he has developed expertise in technology scaling within cereal systems, developing market systems, and strengthening governance in the agricultural research and extension services sector. This is in part due to his strong understanding of local contextual factors that influence the adoption of sustainable intensification technologies, including mechanization.
Since 2024, Sagar has turned his attention to generating innovations, tools and scaling pathways in the mixed farming systems of the mid-hills of Nepal as part of the CGIAR Mixed Farming Systems (MFS) Initiative.
Khandakar Shafiqul Islam is a hub coordinator with CIMMYT in Bangladesh. He is responsible for implementing different projects at field level involving government, non-government and private sector organizations, along with managing resources.
Washiq Faisal is a Research Associate with CIMMYTâs sustainable intensification program, based in Bangladesh. He joined CIMMYT in 2014 and has been involved in applied agricultural research to tackle food insecurity through improved nutrient-rich, high-yielding varieties and sustainable agronomic practices for nearly 15 years.
Faisal is involved in innovative and multi-disciplinary research focused on the principles of sustainable and ecological intensification in smallholder dominated and tropical agricultural systems in Bangladesh. His current research focuses on climate-driven epidemiology of two crop diseases, Stemphylium blight of lentil and wheat leaf rust.
In collaboration with the Bangladesh Meteorological Department (BMD) and Bangladesh Department of Agricultural Extension, Faisal learnt how to use Agvisely, an agro-meteorological services tool providing location-specific advice to farmers.
Cooperative farmers receive training on operation of a mobile seed cleaner in Oromia, Ethiopia. (Credit: Dessalegn Molla/GIZ)
Itâs a familiar problem in international agricultural development â a project with external funding and support has achieved impressive early results, but the money is running out, the time is growing short, and thereâs not a clear plan in place to continue and extend the programâs success.
Over the past seven years, the German development agency Deutsche Gesellschaft fĂŒr Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) established Green Innovation Centers in 13 countries in Africa and two in Asia, partnering with the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) to support projects that introduce mechanization in a way that improves long-term food security and prompts economic growth. Now, as the project enters its final two years of funding, GIZ and CIMMYT are focused on ensuring the gains produced by the Green Innovation Centers are not lost.
Like any complex challenge, thereâs not just one solution to the sustainability problem â but CIMMYT is working to address a massive question around why pilots fail in agricultural development by implementing a systematic approach to scalability that recognizes the critical importance of context and puts projects on a sustainable path before the money is gone.
Training the trainers
As the Green Innovation Centers enter a crucial, final stage, a CIMMYT-led team recently completed training for seven GIZ staff from Ivory Coast, Togo, Ethiopia, and Zambia, who are now certified to facilitate CIMMYTâs Scaling Scan tool and train others to put agricultural innovations in their home countries on a solid path for growth. The training team included CIMMYT scaling advisor Lennart Woltering, CIMMYT mechanization support specialist Leon Jamann, and students from Germanyâs University of Hohenheim and Weihenstephan-Triesdorf University.
The Scaling Scan is a practical tool that helps users set a defined growth ambition, analyze their readiness to scale using ten core ingredients, and identify specific areas that need attention in order to reach the scaling ambition.
The GIZ staff learned to use the Scaling Scan by applying it to early stage innovations in their home countries, ranging from commercial fodder production in the Southern Province of Zambia to seed value chains in the Oromia and Amhara regions of Ethiopia.
Mohammed, a farmer in Amhara, Ethiopia, with a fistful of wheat on his farm. (Credit: Mulugeta Gebrekidan/GIZ)
What will scale up in Ethiopia?
In Ethiopia, smallholding farmers producing legumes, wheat and maize struggle to increase their yield to a level that can improve food security, generate higher incomes for producers and their families, and promote economic growth and jobs in agricultural communities. To help smallholders develop sustainable solutions, GIZ senior advisor Molla Dessalegn worked with his Green Innovation Center team to brainstorm and launch a range of 20 proposed innovations â from risk mitigation and new contract structures to introduction of new technology â all with the aim of improving agricultural yields.
To date, these innovations have introduced over 200,000 Ethiopian smallholders to new knowledge and practices to improve their output. But with the project exit bearing down, Molla and his team were eager to identify which innovations held the most promise for survival and growth beyond the endpoint. So they put their pilot projects to the test using the Scaling Scan.
The scan involves an intensive, day-long seminar originally designed for in-person delivery, but remote versions have also proved successful as COVID limited global travel. The scan focuses on thorough analysis and scoring of the current state of a pilot project and its potential for growth given the realities of conditions on the ground.
Facilitators lead project managers through evaluation of the ten ingredients required for successful scaling, from finance and collaboration to technology, know-how, and public sector governance. The outcome is a clear data set assessing the scalability of the pilot and directing attention to specific areas where improvement is needed before a project can expect serious growth.
An unexpected outcome
What emerged from the scan surprised Molla. Some of the strategies he saw as most successful in the early stages, such as a contract farming program, scored poorly, whereas the scan identified deployment of mobile seed cleaners as a solution that held particular promise for scalability. These outcomes prompted the team to refocus efforts on this strategy.
About 95 percent of Ethiopian smallholders rely on informal seed systems, either saving and reusing seed or exchanging low quality seed with other farmers. Seed cleaning plays a critical role in helping farmers build a high quality, high yield seed development system. Molla and his team had already worked with smallholder cooperatives in Oromia to distribute three mobile seed cleaners, and they knew these machines were being heavily relied upon by farmers in this region.
The Scaling Scan showed them, among other things, that the successful adoption of the seed cleaners had even more potential â it was an innovation that could be sustained and even expanded by local stakeholders, including the Ministry of Agriculture.
This result prompted Molla to recommend investment in additional mobile seed cleaners â four to serve cooperatives in the Amhara region and a fifth for the West Arsi district in Oromia. These machines are now in operation and helping additional smallholders improve the quality of their seed stock. This initial expansion confirms the Scaling Scan results â and CIMMYT plans to continue supporting this growth with the purchase of another round of seed cleaners.
The Scaling Scan also identified problems with the business model for sustaining the mobile seed cleaners through cooperatives in Ethiopia, and this outcome directed the Green Innovation Centers to partner with a consultant to develop improvements in this area. In this way, one of the most important values of the scan is its ability to guide decision-making.
Scaling up the future
Seed cleaners alone wonât solve every yield problem for Ethiopian farmers, but the scan has now guided the initial implementation â and contextual adaptation â of a new form of agricultural mechanization across two regions of the country, with the promise of more to come.
And thereâs more to come from the Scaling Scan as well.
Now that heâs received certification as a trainer, Molla plans to help farmers, officials, and other development workers adopt this rigorous approach to evaluating innovations that show potential. When funding for his project ends in 2024, he will be leaving 300,000 smallholders in Ethiopia with more than machines â he will be leaving them with the knowledge, experience, and practices to make the most of the technological solutions that are improving their yields today and building a more secure future for their communities.
The project goal is to provide smallholder farmers with appropriate mechanization technologies that reduce drudgery during farm operations.
The objectives of the project are:
To promote small-scale mechanization through awareness and demand creation, and service provision of appropriate technologies
To create employment along the mechanization value chain.
The project sites are located in Amhara, Oromia, SNNP (Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples) and Tigray regions of Ethiopia.
The target beneficiaries of the project include smallholder farmers who use traditional methods of farming, the youth who can be employed in service provision activities along the mechanization value chain, service providers, and private sector companies involved in equipment manufacturing and importing.
Through the project, smallholder farmers access planting, harvesting, post-harvest processing (threshing and shelling), irrigation and transport services from service providers located in their communities. The project operates under the Africa-RISING program led by ILRI in Ethiopia.
The Harnessing Appropriate-Scale Farm Mechanization in Zimbabwe (HAFIZ) project aims to support investments by the government and by the private sector in appropriate-scale farm mechanization in Zimbabwe, particularly around Pfumvudza (a system of manual conservation agriculture), and transfer learnings to South Africa.
Overall, the project has the goal to improve access to mechanization and reduce labor drudgery whilst stimulating the adoption of climate-smart/sustainable intensification technologies. The project will improve the understanding of private sector companies involved in appropriate-scale farm mechanisation towards the local markets in which they operate.
Manufacturing knowledge of two-wheel and small four-wheel tractor operated implements for mechanized Pfumvudza will also increase and private sector companies will have increased access to information through the development and strengthening of regional and national communities of practitioners on appropriate-scale farm mechanization. Finally, the project will strengthen the capacity of the existing knowledge networks around appropriate-scale mechanisation in Zimbabwe, through the results that will be generated and through the regular multi-stakeholder roundtables that will be organised.
Objectives
Increasing and more spatially-targeted Government spending in appropriate-scale farm mechanisation in Zimbabwe (and South Africa)
Increasing sales of appropriate-scale farm mechanization equipment in Zimbabwe (and South Africa) thanks to more targeted marketing by private sector (both in terms of geographies and clients)
Local manufacturing and commercialization of two-wheel tractor operated basin diggers and bed planters in Zimbabwe.
Farmers learn about two-wheel tractors. (Photo: CIMMYT)
A new project aims to climate-proof Zimbabwean farms through improved access to small-scale mechanization to reduce labor bottlenecks. Harnessing Appropriate-scale Farm mechanization In Zimbabwe (HAFIZ) is funded by the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) through ACIAR and led by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT).
The project aligns with the Zimbabwean nationwide governmental program Pfumvudza, which promotes agricultural practices based on the principles of conservation agriculture. The initiative aims to increase agricultural productivity through minimum soil disturbance, a permanent soil cover, mulching and crop diversification.
Over 18 months, the project will work with selected service providers to support mechanized solutions that are technically, environmentally and economically appropriate for use in smallholder settings.
Speaking during the project launch, the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development in Zimbabwe, John Basera, explained the tenets of Pfumvudza which translates as âa new season.â A new season of adopting climate-smart technologies, conservation agriculture practices and increasing productivity. Simply put, Pfumvudza means a sustainable agricultural productivity scheme.
âPfumvudza was a big game-changer in Zimbabwe. We tripled productivity from 0.45 to 1.4 [metric tons] per hectare. Now the big challenge for all of us is to sustain and consolidate the growth, and this is where mechanization comes into place,â Basera said. âThis project is an opportunity for the smallholder farmer in Zimbabwe, who contributes to over 60% of the food in the country, to be able to produce more with less.â
Building on the  findings of the completed ACIAR-funded project Farm Mechanization and Conservation Agriculture for Sustainable Intensification (FACASI), the new initiative will work with selected farmers and service providers to identify farming systems most suitable for mechanization. It will also assist companies in targeting their investments as they test a range of technologies powered by small-engine machinery adapted to the Zimbabwe context and transfer the resultant learnings to South Africa.
Conservation agriculture adoption offers multidimensional benefits to the farmers with significant yields and sustainability of their systems. The introduction of mechanization in systems using animals for draught reduces the livestock energy demand â energy that will contribute to increasing meat and milk production.
While conservation agriculture and research alone cannot solve all the issues affecting agricultural productivity, awareness-raising is integral to help address these issues, and this is where small-scale mechanization comes in, says ACIAR Crops Research Program Manager, Eric Huttner.
âWe learnt a lot from FACASI and a similar project in Bangladesh on the opportunities of appropriate small-scale mechanization as a tool towards sustainable intensification when adopted by farmers,â he explained. âIf we avoid the mistakes of the past, where large-scale mechanization efforts were invested in the wrong place and resulted in ineffective machines unusable for farmers, we can make a huge difference in increasing yields and reducing farm drudgery,â Huttner said.
More than 40% of the global agricultural labor force is made up of women, and in the least developed countries, two in three women are employed in farming. Yet, despite being the largest contributors to this sector, womenâs potential as farmers, producers and entrepreneurs is frequently untapped due to gender inequalities, limited access to farming assets and inputs, low participation in decision-making spaces, and lack of financing and capacity-building opportunities.
Tackling these gendered barriers is critical not only to help women achieve their highest economic potential, but also to feed an increasingly hungry world. Before this yearâs Womenâs History Month comes to an end, read the stories of three Bangladeshi womenâBegum, Akter and Raniâto find out how the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) are empowering them to become decision-makers in their communities, learn new skills and knowledge to boost their incomes, and advocate for bending gender norms across the country.
Embracing agricultural mechanization has improved Begumâs family finances
Rina Begum lives in Faridpur, a major commercial hub in southern Bangladesh. Before starting a business, her financial situation was precarious. Her primary source of income was her husbandâs work as a day laborer, which brought in very little money. This, coupled with the lack of job security, made it hard to support a family.
Rina Begum started out in business as a service provider, hiring agricultural machines to farmers.
About five years ago, Begumâs interest in agricultural mechanization was ignited by the farmers in her town, who were earning extra money by investing in farm machinery and hiring it out. Her first foray into the business world was buying a shallow irrigation pump and setting herself up as a service provider. Next, she saw her neighbor using a power tiller operated seeder and decided to try one out for herself. Finally, after taking part in a potential machinery buyer program run by CIMMYT under the Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia â Mechanization and Irrigation (CSISA-MEA) and funded by USAID, she took the bold step of purchasing a seeder and adding it to her inventory of machines available for hire.
While her husband learned to operate the seeder, Begum put her business and accounting skills to good use, taking on an essential role in what ended up being the family business and establishing herself as an entrepreneur. Her work defied the established social norms, as she regularly interacted with the mechanics and farmers who came to her for mechanized services. Moreover, she occasionally stepped up alongside her husband to repair and maintain the machines. All this earned Begum a reputation as an experienced service provider, operator and mechanic, and turned her into a decision-maker and a role model to her family and community.
In 2021, Begum used her business profits to pick up the bill for her daughter’s marriage. “I know this job inside-out now,” she says, “and Iâm really proud to have paid for the wedding myself.”
This taste of success fueled Begumâs appetite to expand the business even further, pushing her to take part in another training offered by CIMMYT, this time in mat-seedling production. Moreover, Begum, who plans to grow seedlings to sell on to rice farmers this year, has applied for a government subsidy to buy a rice transplanter, which can be hired out for use with mat-seedlings, and increase her stock of agricultural machinery.
With her new skills, Akter is advancing gender equality in Bangladeshâs light engineering sector
At age 18, Nilufar Akter (pictured top) passed her high school certificate and soon after married Rezaul Karim, the owner of a light engineering workshop in Bogura, a city in northern Bangladesh, that manufactures agricultural machinery parts, with a workforce mainly composed of men. Akterâs ambition was to go out into the workplace and make her own money, so when Karim asked her to work alongside him, she agreed and soon became a valuable part of the business. Her primary responsibilities were inventory management and marketing, as well as business management, which she found more difficult.
Reza Engineering Workshop began working with CIMMYT in 2020 as part of CSISA-MEA, an initiative that supports light engineering workshops in Bangladesh with staff development, access to finance, management, and business growth. Under this project, CIMMYT organized a management training at the Bangladesh Agriculture Research Institute (BARI), which Akter attended. With the confidence these new skills gave her, she went back to the workshop and introduced a few changes, including building a computerized finance management system and updating the stack management. Moreover, she also established a dedicated restroom for female employees.
“We need human resources to maintain things in the businessâand women can do a fantastic jobâ, Akter says. âWe had no idea what good source of strength women workers would be for the factory. Therefore, if we provided them with adequate facilities, we could create jobs for many women who really need them”, she adds.
Akterâs current priorities are workshop safety and occupational health, two issues sheâs tackling using the knowledge she learned in the CIMMYT training. Recently, sheâs created some occupational health and safety posters, and established a series of workshop rules. “I used to think I wasnât cut out for light engineering because it was primarily male-dominated, but I was mistakenâ, Akter confesses. âThis industry has a lot to offer to women, and I’m excited at the prospect of hiring more of them”, she adds.
Producing better quality rice has boosted the income of Rani and her family
Monika Rani lives in Khoshalpur, a village located in Dinajpur district in northern Bangladesh, with her husband Liton Chandra Roy and their two-year-old child. They farm just a quarter of a hectare of land, and Liton supplements their income with occasional wages earned as a day laborer.
Monika Rani wanted to increase her family’s income to provide better schooling opportunities for her children.
Rani was looking for ways to increase their income so they could give their children an education and a better life. During last yearâs boro rice-growing season (December to May), she and her husband joined the premium grade rice production team of CIMMYT as part of CSISA-MEA. The market value and yield of premium quality rice is greater than other types, so when Rani heard that she could make more money producing that variety, she decided to make a start right away. CIMMYT provided her with five kgs of premium seed for the 2021-22 winter season and trained her in premium quality rice production technology and marketing, which she followed to the letter.
Through hard work and persistence, Rani and her husband avoided the need to hire any additional labor and were rewarded with the maximum yield possible. She dried the premium quality rice grain according to buyer demand and sold 1,600 kgs, in addition to 140 kgs to farmers in her town.
“Knowing about premium quality rice production has tremendously changed my future for the better,” Rani explains. “I had no idea that, through my own hard effort, I could have a better life”, she added.
Cover photo: Nilufar Akter is using the knowledge she gained in CIMMYT training to focus on workshop safety and occupational health in her business.
Md Abdul Matin is a Mechanization Specialist at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), SARO, Zimbabwe.
He has over 20 years of R&D experience in design, development, assessment and commercialization of farm machinery for smallholder farmers. He completed his BSc Agri. Engg and MS in Farm Power & Machinery degrees from the Bangladesh Agricultural University and a PhD from the Agricultural Machinery Research & Design Centre, University of South Australia, Adelaide, Australia. Matin has intensive experience working with national agricultural research institutes, other government and private sector partners (including manufacturers) in the mechanization value and supply chains.
Introducing mechanization services in any smallholder farming community has proven to yield multiple benefits largely aimed at increasing farming efficiency but importantly creating a solid economic base to boost farmer incomes. Anchored on the two-wheel tractor along with implements for land preparation, planting, harvesting, shelling, transporting, appropriate-scale mechanization has in the last seven years gained currency across African farming households.
Interventions such as the mechanization pilot implemented by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) provide a channel through which smallholder farmers with access to some financial resources can invest to become a viable enterprise. Â The aim of this intervention is not to make every farmer own its own machinery, which would be costly and inefficient, but to train farmers to become service providers to other community members. This model has been effectively tried before in other places under the Farm Mechanization and Conservation Agriculture for Sustainable Intensification (FACASI) project.
A recent visit to two service providers in southern Zimbabwe, demonstrates the high returns on investment achieved through enrolling in mechanization service provision.
Two service providers, one vision: Profit
Julius Shava (53) and Prince Chimema (22), shared their experience in offering diverse transporting and land preparation services using the two-wheel tractor, trailer, direct seeder, and sheller procured through the initiative. Â Narrating how he learnt about the mechanization pilot and his subsequent enrolment, Shava explains how potential service providers had to make a financial commitment to the business before accessing the equipment.
âThrough this mechanization business model, we would receive a two-wheel tractor, trailer, sheller, and seeder worth USD5,000, at a subsidized price of $USD2,500. The main condition for accessing this package was to pay a commitment fee of USD500 – there was no way I could let that opportunity slip away,â explains Shava.
âMy wife and I decided to sell two cows to raise the funds and made the payment. Some community members were initially skeptical of the approach when it seemed that the consignment was delayed yet when the two-wheel tractor arrived, they were among the first to inquire about the services I was offering,â Shava adds.
âI made sure they all understood what I could provide for them using the 2WT and trailer such as land preparation and transportation – of manure, gravel stones and pit sand among other things.â
The multipurpose trailer with a loading capacity of up to one and a half tonnes can be attached to the two-wheel tractor for the provision of transport services. (S.Chikulo/CIMMYT)
Shava and Chimema are among fifteen service providers leading in the mechanization pilot initiative launched in July 2020 in Masvingo district. The initiative is supported by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and managed by the World Food Program (WFP). The private sector machinery company Kurima Machinery facilitates provision of the two-wheel tractor, planter, trailer and sheller while the Zimbabwe Agriculture Trust (ZADT) manages the lease-to-own business model anchoring the mechanization pilot to the financial sector.
Counting the cost and returns
âHow much turnover does a service provider realise on average?â is a question frequently asked by other farmers keen to take up the enterprise.
Shava explains the factors he considers, âWhen someone is hiring my services, I charge according to the distance and load to be transported.â For example, for a 200m delivery radius, I can charge USD5. However, for land preparation and ploughing, I charge USD100 per hectare.â He quickly adds that he also factors in his labor, fuel requirements and time into the final price of his service â a principle he learnt during a specialized technical and business training provided by Gwebi College of Agriculture for the mechanization pilot.
In addition, using the two-wheel tractor is efficient as a hectare is completed in about one hour where an animal drawn plough takes up to six hours or more, depending on the soil type. The reduced drudgery allows farmers to rest their livestock and adopt more efficient and sustainable land preparation technologies. Shava notes that these advantages are immediately apparent to farmers who seek the service.
Customers often pay in cash which is convenient for him as he saves the money or uses some of it to meet expenses related to the service provision. âSo far I have reached up to 7 customers after two months from the Nemamwa area in Ward 12 of Masvingo and they were seeking different services. âFor land preparation they were paying USD100 per hectare. In Ward 8, I managed to get about three customers.
âWhen it comes to pricing, I leave room for negotiation because it is inevitable that customers will always ask for a discount, but I ensure that I do not incur losses.â Since venturing into mechanization service provision, Shava has realized a gross income of USD$600 before deducting expenses such as fuel and regular maintenance. However, the two-wheel tractor is fuel efficient – utilizing at least seven liters of diesel per hectare. Diesel fuel is purchased in Masvingo town or from informal markets at the business center at a cost of USD1 per liter.
Young service providers making their mark
Service providers such as Prince Chimema, who are young, energetic and business minded are also among those quickly realizing the high returns on the small mechanization investment. Coming from a family of seven, Chimema – recently married and with a two-year old child – has found a secure income stream in service provision of different mechanization services.
âI am grateful for the financial support from my parents that enabled me to enroll into the mechanization pilot program,â says Chimeme. Like Shava, Chimemaâs parents sold two cows to raise the USD500 commitment fee. Soon, Chimema was approaching his relatives and neighbors in the community demonstrating the transporting, planting and land preparation services that he could provide. âSome of my customers would have seen me delivering manure or quarry stones to another household before requesting for my services; that is how my customer base has increased steadily.â
When pricing, Chimema considers the distance, fuel and time it will take to deliver the load. âIn this area, requests are for transporting manure, quarry stones, pit sand and river sand. The price ranges from USD4 â USD8 per load. While most villagers pay in cash, a few may request to pay in kind using chickens,â
Chimemaâs marketing strategy has been to push volumes by advertising his transporting services to other farmers outside of Ward 18. To date, he has focused on clients requiring transportation services. In Wards 18 and 19, Chimema has served a total of 60 customers, generating USD400 within the first two months of commencing the business.
Challenges and early lessons
Venturing into small mechanized service provision has not been without its challenges as attested by Chimema and Shava, âA lesson I learnt from the onset is never to overload the trailer beyond the recommended capacity,â explains Chimema. âDuring the mechanization training, we were advised that the trailerâs maximum carrying capacity is between 750-1000kg but at times I could overlook this leading to faults developing on my tractor,â says Prince.
Fuel access also presents challenges at times. âWe have to get fuel from Masvingo because the quality of fuel here in the ward may be compromised while the price is slightly inflated because of the middlemen selling the fuel.
The delay in delivery of tractor-drawn direct seeders reduced the potential number of customers for both Chimema and Shava for planting services, as most farmers had proceeded to plant given the early onset of the rainy season. However, both service providers are hopeful that in the next season, with all the equipment in place, they can provide the full range of services to fellow smallholders.
Continuous improvement of the technology by including a toolbar is currently underway, which eases the level of effort required to operate the two-wheel tractor, making it more flexible for the service providers.
Twenty-two-year-old Prince Chimema of Ward 18 Masvingo district demonstrating the two-row direct seeder attached to the two-wheel tractor. (S.Chikulo/CIMMYT)
A vision for expansion and rural transformation
Chimema and Shava are optimistic about the future growth and performance of their business. Both aspire to expand their service provision over the coming five years by purchasing a second two-wheel tractor and creating employment for other villagers. âThe income for the second two-wheel tractor should be generated from the current businessâ explains Shava.
In addition to the land preparation and transporting services, the maize sheller is set to increase their income. With a shelling capacity of 3-4 tons per day, the maize sheller significantly reduces the amount of time and effort required to shell a ton of maize manually (12.5 days).
âThe priority now is to make sure that the loan repayment happens smoothly because I am generating enough income to pay back up for my package,â explains Shava. Once the payment is done, Shava would like to set up a borehole and drip irrigation system for their family plot and complete construction of his house in Masvingo town.
Chimema, on the other hand, is keen to start a poultry project. He is currently assisting his parents to pay school fees for his younger sibling but believes the poultry project will increase his income stream. âAs I broadcast and market my services by word of mouth and through mobile platform messages; there is room for me to expand beyond Ward 18 and 19,â says Chimema. âI hope to employ at least two more people in the coming two or three years, to help me deliver the services to other farmers,â he adds.
âWith the business experience gained from the current season, small mechanization service providers such as Chimema and Shava can increase the portfolio of services to customersâ, says Christian Thierfelder, Principal Scientist at CIMMYT, leading the effort. âFor example, at planting stage, service providers could provide a complete package for farmers including seed and fertilizer as well as a supply of appropriate herbicides for weed control as part of the land preparation and direct seeding service. Such an offering increases the value of the service and affords farmers the opportunity to witness the full benefits of small mechanized agricultureâ, Thierfelder says.
âWe have to provide farmers with options to abandon the hoe. The drudgery of farming has made this profession so unattractive that a rural exodus is looming. Providing business, employment and entrepreneurship will bring back hope and will lead to a true rural and agriculture transformation in Zimbabwe.â The high return on investment of the mechanized package makes it a viable year-round business option for farmers and entrepreneurs in rural Masvingo. The pilot is providing a proof of concept that this model works, even under low-potential environments.
Cover photo: Julius Shava and his wife standing at their lease-to-own two-wheel tractor which is part of the starter package for small-mechanization service providers in Masvingo District. (S.Chikulo/CIMMYT)
Agriculture mechanization in Bangladesh connects local manufacturers of machinery parts (which is mainly done by the countryâs light engineering industry) and the operation of those machines, generally run by machinery solution providers. These two workforces are equally male-dominated. The reasons behind this are social norms, and family and community preconceptions, coupled with the perception that women cannot handle heavy machinery. But a deeper look into this sector shows us a different reality, where many women are working enthusiastically as part of agriculture mechanization.
The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) is supporting women to work in light engineering workshops, and to become entrepreneurs by providing machinery solutions to farmers.
Painting her own dream
Rokeya Begum, 39, has been working in Uttara Metal Industries for three and half years, clearing up and assisting her male colleagues in paint preparation. All this time, she wanted to be the one doing the painting.
Begum was one of the 30 young women from Bogura, Northern Bangladesh, recently trained by CIMMYT through the Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia-Mechanization Extension Activity (CSISA-MEA). They learnt various aspects of the painting trade and related operational techniques, such as mixing colors, the difference between primer and topcoats, and health and safety in the workplace.
Now the focus is on job creation for women in the sector. CIMMYT has initiated discussions with established enterprises to recruit women as painters in their workshops, with all the benefits of their male counterparts.
Having completed painting training, Begum practices spray painting for an hour every day. Her employer is happy with her finished work and plans to promote her to the position of painter. Begum says, âIâm so happy to have learned a new technique â plus I really enjoy the work.â Her current pay of $12 per week will increase by 50% when she starts her new job.
Alongside training, this mechanization activity is working to create a decent and safe working environment for women, including adequate, private and safe spaces, such as bathrooms and places to take breaks.
Seedling of an entrepreneur
For the first time ever, in the last monsoon aman rice cultivation season, Kulsum Akter, 30, earned $130, by selling rice seedlings she had grown to be planted out by mechanical rice transplanters. Two years ago, Akterâs husband Md. Abdul Motaleb bought a rice transplanter with the assistance of a government subsidy from the Government of Bangladeshâs Department of Agricultural Extension. While he invested $5,000 in the machine, his skills in operating it were sub-par.
Supported by the USAID-funded Feed the Future Bangladesh Mechanization and Extension Activity, Motaleb was trained in mechanized rice transplanter operation by a private company, The Metal Pvt. Ltd.
Akter was in turn trained in special techniques for growing seedlings so they can be planted out using a rice transplanting machine. CIMMYT then provided technical and business guidance to this husband-and-wife duo, enabling them to embark confidently on a strong business venture. Key training topics included growing mat-type seedlings for machines, business management, cost-benefit analysis, product promotion and business expansion concepts. Motaleb went on to provide mechanical transplanting services to other farmers in the locality.
Meanwhile, Akter was inspired to take the lead in preparing seedlings as a business venture to sell to farmers who use mechanical rice transplanters. Akter invested $100 in the last aman season, by the end of which she had earned $230 by selling the seedlings in just one month. This success has encouraged her to prepare seedlings for many more farmers during the winter rice production season. âThe training in rice transplanter operation and seedling preparation was a gift for us. Iâm trying to get more women into this business â and Iâm pretty optimistic about it,â Akter says. Through the Mechanization and Extension Activity, CIMMYT aims to create more than 100 women entrepreneurs like Akter who will contribute to the mechanization of agriculture through their work as service providers.
CSISA-MEAâs work increases womenâs capacity to work in the agricultural mechanization sector and manage machinery-based businesses through technical and business training. Through opportunities like these, more women like Begum and Akter will be enabled to achieve self-sufficiency and contribute to the development of this sector.
Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia Mechanization Extension Activity (CSISA-MEA) is funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Feed the Future initiative.
Cover photo: The CSISA-MEA project increases womenâs capacity to work in the agricultural mechanization sector, therefore achieving self-sufficiency. (Abdul Momin/CIMMYT)
