By Gift Bhowa

THE Ministry of Higher and Tertiary Education, Science and Technology Development has challenged tertiary institutions in the country to invest in science and technology in order to imbue students with practical skills to transform agriculture production in Zimbabwe.
The call comes in the wake of changes to the weather patterns which has severely affected the climate.
According to Professor Amon Murwira, the Higher and Tertiary Education, Science and Technology Development Minister, heritage-based education will improve the critical skills invention level which is currently at 38 percent, translating to an 88 percent skills deficit in agriculture.
Climate change has become a reality which has seen regions getting drier, with low rainfall patterns and El Nino effects that have devastated many communities.
Efforts to adapt to climate change have seen the coming into use of shorter season seed varieties, among them small grains.
The use of underground water for irrigation has also helped in ensuring food security.
Agricultural experts have advised farmers to also use indigenous knowledge systems along with scientific knowledge in order to improve their yields.
Speaking during the official opening ceremony of the Food Security and Climate Change Conference recently, Minister Murwira said education plays a critical role in rebuilding Zimbabwe, hence the education system should provide a platform of heritage-based education that will help in the development and transformation of agriculture.
“We want to create a Zimbabwe of our dreams that is free from hunger, poverty and preventable diseases all through education,” Minister Murwira said.
“If you are in this and you know very well that this country has good soils and climate, I expect the agricultural science to be very good (sic).
“That is what I call heritage-based education.”
Education, said Minister Murwira, should be principled to transform lives of the people by understanding their environment that they want to transform while making efforts to restructure the higher and tertiary education system.
Said Minister Murwira: “In order to transfigure people’s lives, we need principal skills to reconfigure the higher and tertiary education system to deliver a modernised and industrialised economy.
“In order to achieve this, we need a set of education principles to follow (sic).
“In Zimbabwe, we must be able to say the principles of education are heritage-based learning, industrialisation and innovation (sic).”
The Ministry of Education has unveiled the Zimbabwe National Qualification Framework (ZNQF) a system which looks at universities programmed infrastructure to encourage transparency in the education system.
“We have created a system ZNQF together with all universities in Zimbabwe which tells us how the vertical mobility of our students and the horizontal concreability of our degrees (sic),” he said.
“If you have a degree in crop science, surely those degrees must have at least 60 percent of overlap so as to professionalise degrees.”
Refresher courses have been used in various industries in order to ensure that people’s skills are kept updated.
Minister Murwira added that education that does not produce goods and services is knowledge that is dead.
“We need an education system whose objective is to understand the environment that it seeks to transform and the environment that it exists in,” he said.
“We also want an education system that espouses productivity and humility.
“We want an education system that espouses know-how, which basically means knowledge and skills.”
The education system has fostered curriculum changes to develop skilled students who possess modern skills which are vital in the transformation of agriculture in the country.
In an interview with The Patriot, Professor Sheunesu Mpepereki said there is need to ensure students are equipped with practical skills.
“There have been significant curriculum changes as seen through the Grade Seven students who are writing their first agriculture papers and we hope that will cascade all the way up to ‘A’-Level where agriculture becomes an important subject,” Professor Mpepereki said.
“It must be made clear in the curriculum that students must have practical experience so that they acquire not only theoretical but practical skills as well.
“All schools in Zimbabwe must make sure that they have a farm so that students can get practical skills on the ground.
“If students are being taught agricultural science, they should see how the science works in the field and that should be on a daily basis.”
Many universities have their own farms where students are able to engage in practical production.
Professor Mpepereki also highlighted that the Central Mechanical Equipment Department (CMED) is offering different courses to various categories of people so that they get the required practical skills.
“CMED has initiated different programmes that offer different courses to graduate students and external people to cement skills practical application,” he said.
“We must retrain graduates and lecturers so that they remain relevant for us to meet Vision 2030.
“If they are already working for AGRITEX, we need a lot of in-service courses which have the orientation towards practicals.”
Scarcity of resources has been the major hindrance to the progress of imparting practical skills to farmers, students, and external people.