SOETZim Magazine September 2022 Issue 8

Rising From Drought Together Tinotenda Nyamurowa

On the 17th of June the world observed The World Day to Combat Drought and this year’s theme was “Rising from Drought Together”. The main objective of this day is to create awareness and find achievable solutions that can be implemented to combat desertification and effects of droughts. This year’s theme comes in the wake of ravaging droughts occurring in the eastern region of Africa specifically Kenya and Somalia, widespread death of livestock and water scarcity is being witnessed. Announcing this year’s theme, the UNCCD, Executive secretary said “Droughts have been part of human and natural systems, but what we are experiencing now is much worse, largely due to human activity. Recent droughts point at a precarious future for the world. Food and water shortages as well as wildfires caused by the severe drought have all intensified in recent years”.

Drought is the naturally occurring phenomenon that exists when precipitation has been significantly below normal recorded levels, causing serious hydrological imbalances that adversely affect land resource production systems.

Causes of drought Impacts of drought

1. Natural causes

2. Excess water demands

3. Altered weather patterns

Deforestation and soil degradation

5. Climate change

Hunger and famine

Shortage of water

Social conflicts and war

Mass migrations and relocation

Preventive measures and Solutions to problems caused by Drought

1. Harvesting rainwater

This is an easy solution to droughts and can be employed with ease at home. With rainwater harvesting homes can store the water they get from rain and then use it when they need it in dry conditions, rather than exhausting present water bodies like rivers. If a house has a primary water source, then rainwater harvesting provides them with an auxiliary option that they can use when water is not available.

2. Planting more trees and combating deforestation

This is something that needs to be employed by everyone in the world and can result in billions of trees planted daily. It is a piece of old age advice but still applies today. Planting more trees will improve the quality of the environment and increase the success of precipitation. It can also reverse the drought and arid conditions of an area if the trees are maintained well until maturity. With planting more trees, the other solution is to avoid the existing ones, unless more are planted.

3. Switching to renewable energies

We have, for long, relied on non-renewable sources for our energy like petroleum. The extraction and use of these energies result in more greenhouse gases being pumped into the atmosphere, resulting in global warming, and of course droughts. The alternative is to switch to renewable sources like wind and solar, which have little to no effect on the environment and will not result in droughts.

1. Stricter government policies

Stringent laws need to be implemented on those who use practices that can result in droughts or other environmentally damaging results. Doing this will stop climate change and solve the ongoing droughts. They include limiting the amounts of greenhouse gases being pumped into the atmosphere and higher taxes for non compliance.

This includes educating the younger generation on the need to protect, preserve and improve the environment, recycling, reusing and planting more trees. The education curriculum, the news media and companies also need to stress the need to care for the environment, so that it becomes an individual task to prevent droughts.

Drought case study Kenya

Eastern and northern Kenya have received only minimal rainfall during the March to May 2022 long rains season, marking the fourth consecutive below average season. Widespread livestock deaths, minimal livestock productivity, very low cropping levels, and sharp declines in purchasing power are creating large food consumption gaps and high levels of acute malnutrition among millions of households in eastern and northern Kenya About 4 5 million people need humanitarian food assistance, and while ongoing assistance is currently mitigating the severity of acute food insecurity, Emergency outcomes are increasingly likely as needs outpace assistance levels The current drought is already historic in its length and severity, and forecast models are now signalling an elevated likelihood that the October to December 2022 short rains season will also be below average, setting the stage for an unprecedented five season drought. This will only increase the severity and scale of food assistance needs into 2023, and a significant and sustained scale up of humanitarian assistance is needed to save lives and livelihoods Rainfall totals through April for the main season long rains were less than 60 percent of the 40 year average across most of Kenya, with many areas of northern and eastern Kenya receiving less than 45 percent of the 40-year average. In pastoral areas, vegetation greenness is significantly below the 20122021 mean and monitored water points range from empty to well below median depths Sentinel site data from Kenya’s National Drought Management Authority (NDMA) suggest significantly longer trekking distances, and reports suggest up to 1 5 million livestock, particularly cattle and sheep, have died between October 2021 and March 2022. County level livestock mortality rates are upwards of 12 percent, diminishing livestock herds In addition to low herd sizes, the amount of maize that can be purchased from the sale of a goat is around 10 50 percent below what is typical, and at near record lows given high maize prices and low livestock value. Moreover, livestock milk production, a key source of food and cash income for pastoralists, is 10 80 percent below average. The overall decline in household access to food is driving up levels of acute malnutrition, which exceed Extremely Critical levels in Mandera County per a March 2022 SMART survey by UNICEF, reported deaths of children under five due to severe acute malnutrition complications. In marginal agricultural areas, household food stocks are already depleted due to poor past seasons, and household income from agricultural labour is lower than usual due to a drop in demand. Normally, poor households in these areas rely on long rains crop production to cover about 10 percent of their annual food needs, while the sale of crops, agricultural wage labour, and the sale of livestock and livestock products provide income to purchase food. In addition to low labour demand, the amount of maize that a household can purchase with the daily wage has fallen; maize and bean prices are 10 25 percent above average, contributing to goat to maize terms of trade that are 5 50 percent below average. Households are increasingly applying consumption and livelihood based coping strategies such as reducing the number and size of meals, purchasing food on credit, sending household members to eat elsewhere, reducing expenses on health, and eating seed stocks. Ongoing humanitarian and livelihoods support through the Hunger Safety Net Programme (HSNP) and Emergency HSNP scale up payments are mitigating more severe acute food insecurity, and the government of Kenya has released over 33 million USD for drought

mitigation. However, needs far outstrip assistance levels. The Kenya Drought Flash Appeal of 2021/2022 remains just 20 percent funded with only 28.5 million USD received out of the required 139.5 million USD.

In Turkana, one of the hottest and driest regions of the world, lakeside communities can no longer survive on fishing. Over 90 per cent of the open water sources have dried up and the remaining sources are expected to last only between one and two months in ASAL region, some people in Turkana are forced to spend their days simply searching for water and the distance to find water keeps increasing, the report mentioned. People have to walk more than 15 kilometres every day to take water from an untreated borehole for drinking and cooking. Many children in Turkana and across Kenya’s droughtaffected regions are forced to drop out of school to engage in labour or survival activities to support their families, OCHA observed. Girls walk long distances to help their mothers fetch water or sell firewood and charcoal. Boys migrate to other areas, seeking pasture for livestock

Conclusion

To reduce the impacts of desertification and droughts an integrated and collaborative approach needs to adopted starting from local communities then extent to the global scene. With the current statistics and levels of desertification there is need to take immediate action since natural causes combined anthropogenic activities are the enabling factors of rampant desertification process. The rampant droughts occurring in Kenya also showcase the devastating impacts of climate change, global warming and other human activities. As stated by this year’s theme “Rising up from drought together”, we need to put our heads together and come up with ideas, adopt new green technology, educate and adopt good soil conservation and regreening techniques.

Celebrating Lions

Celebrating Lions

Impact of Cleanup Campaigns

By Lynn Ruzare

Cleanup campaigns in Zimbabwe were officiated by our Presidents that we raise awareness about the scale of litter and also engage the whole nation including school going children so that they too contribute to this mass campaign by the government and also get grassroots and also understand why Cleanup campaigns are important

The cleanup campaigns are done every first Friday of the month and volunteerism is sometimes apriority to reach the goal of an environment clean Zimbabwe. The cleanup campaigns are done to promote waste reduction, recycle, reuse and furthermore create public awareness on waste management and environmental concerns.

The cleanup campaigns have impacted our communities to a greater extent because as time has passed the cleanups are not being done on first Fridays anymore......people now have focus group discussions on how best to eradicate litter. The Gweru City council is now burning litter that cannot be recycled occasionally and also there are some individuals who are making a living out of recycling litter. Some individuals are actually so creative that they are enhancing their art work by creating different cultures using the material that they have recycled or that has been thrown away and making a living.

Slowly and gradually wear seeing our waste levels dropping because there are individuals who have dedicated heir time no matter how hectic their schedules are to address the issue of waste management and making sure that our Environment is habitable.... ...In Gweru as we all know the refuse collection levels are dwindling since our City council is struggling financially.

....So l urge everyone no matter how small

your contribution is pleased do it whole heartedly because it makes a difference in our community and in this mass drive of cleaning our environment.

The Council itself needs training or awareness on Environmentally friendly methods of dealing with waste. For example where l stay the burn litter every Tuesday....it’s a scheduled event and people condone it because it is a fast and effect method or them.

Climate change and its impact on ground water aquifers in Zimbabwe –

By Ruvarashe Mutadza

Climate change refers to longterm shifts in temperatures and weather patterns. These shifts may be natural, such as through variations in the solar cycle. Since the Industrial Revolution in the 1800s, our planet has been heating up at a much quicker rate than ever before with damaging consequences. We’ve been burning fossil fuels such as coal and gas to provide electricity, heating and transport, but this releases carbon dioxide, methane and other gases into the atmosphere. As a result, we’re seeing extreme weather, from floods to droughts across the globe. It is also causing shifts in seasonal patterns.

The Earth is warming up at a steady pace, and the increase in human caused greenhouse gases has led to health, ecological and humanitarian crises. While we can’t reverse the damage, we can make changes to slow things down, reduce our impact here on earth and create a more sustainable future.

Although drought years are part of the normal climate cycle in this part of Africa often associated with the well known El Niño Southern Oscillation global warming is causing droughts to become more frequent, more intense, and less predictable.

Depletion of groundwater is especially relevant for tropical countries like Zimbabwe. Many hand pumped boreholes and wells are drying up in Zimbabwe, forcing thousands of people in rural areas to crowd for drinking water at the few sources where water is still available. Annual rainfall is no longer sufficient to replenish the aquifers that nourish these boreholes as a result of climate change. As the world warms, amplification of rainfall extremes and their consequences will be most pronounced in the tropics where Zimbabwe is happening to be found.

Water shortages are getting worse with each passing day and in most areas have now reached critical levels including Mutare. “We are now strictly rationing the little water still available. Each household is getting only 20 litres of water per day for cooking and other household uses regardless of the size of a family,” Muradzikwa said (Mambondiyani, 2020). Across Zimbabwe, a large population depends on groundwater for household, agricultural, and industrial use. Underground water is recharged by normal seasonal rains, and Zimbabwe is getting less seasonal rainfall. The country has suffered severe recurrent droughts since 1992. In long periods of droughts, there is a higher risk of depletion of aquifers,

especially in cases of small and shallow aquifers. People in water scarce areas will increasingly depend on groundwater because of its buffer capacity (Zhakata, 2020). As a result of climate change, when it rains these days, it’s so intense not to allow gradual seepage of the water to lower depths. Water is then lost as runoff into the streams and straight to the nearby ocean. There is a need for strategic use of groundwater for food security in a changing climate.

Every water user needs to utilize water resources sustainably to allow water seepage to greater depths and recharge our groundwater.

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RURAL WOMEN PRACTISING AGROECOLOGY - By PETER TANAKA MUDZINGWA

Studies concludes that around a third of the world’s food is produced by smallholder farmers on less than two hectares of land. In SubSaharan Africa, the percentage is much larger, with some 60% of the population engaged as smallholder farmers in food production and processing. At least half of these farmers are women who play a crucial role in the food chain. Rural women specialize in seeding, weeding, transplanting, harvesting, post harvest work, processing, marketing and, in some areas, land preparation. They also prepare forest fruits, freshwater fish, and livestock products for consumption by their families and communities. Large proportion of rural women experience extreme marginalization, exclusion from decision-making, denial of essential resources such as land, water, credit, S information, and technologies, and disregard for their deep knowledge of local circumstances and feasible solutions.

Faced with these enormous challenges, rural women farmers continue to show admirable tenacity as they grow nutritious foods to feed their families and communities using Agroecological farming practices. Agroecology is the practice and science of applying ecological concepts, knowledge, and principles to the design and management of food and

agricultural systems. Agroecological approaches include diversification of crops, conservation tillage, green manures, organic compost, biological pest control, and rainwater harvesting. This helps conserve the land and environment, making it more resilient to climatic extremes and ensuring healthy and nutritious foods are available in rural and urban communities. The adoption of agroecological farming practices by peasant and indigenous women has also united local communities by providing sharing and learning leading opportunities for rural women farmers. In Shashi region of Mashava, Masvingo Province, women are the seed custodians as they work as a collective termed as mushandirapamwe to reduce their workload thus uniting the community.

Mushandirapamwe is a shona word that translates to working together as one, and it is very common practice among women seed custodian in Shashi. In Shashi peasant and seed custodians explained how agroecology has reduced their farming workload and improved their social life. Over 100 women gather at the Shashi agroecology school displaying, exchanging, and selling locally their diverse seed varieties. Some of the seeds that women display include pulses, cereals, and oils. Women have found it that food that are produce through agroecological practices improves the health and quality of Soil, water and seed and it also reduce the impacts of climate change. Foods that are produced through agroecological practices are free from chemicals and they promote good healthy to consumers. Diversification of indigenous food crops through agroecology not only promote food security it also promotes food sovereignty to families practicing agroecology.

Renewable Energy: Our Hope to limiting temperatures to 1.5 degrees

– By Vivian Nheya (SCAT)

Limiting global temperatures to 1.5 degrees is not an individual task but rather it requires collective efforts by governments, the private sector, CSOs, NGOs and individuals at large to work together to achieve the objective of the Paris Agreement. Zimbabwe’s economy is likely to grow resulting in a possible increase in greenhouse gas emissions therefore the need to shift to renewable energy use. Zimbabwe has vast renewable energy resources that are underutilised the primary sources are solar, hydro and biomass. The Government of Zimbabwe has committed to advancing the Sustainable Energy for All (SE4ALL)

agenda in the country and seeks to achieve the three SE4ALL objectives, mainly the universal energy access, renewable energy, and energy efficiency. This will guarantee that each household and industrial sector will receive an appropriate supply of energy supplied in a sustainable, efficient and cost effective way. This also entails that clean energy sources are adopted that will facilitate a green economy in the energy sector and can enhance socio-economic and sustainable development, with fringe environmental impacts.

Zimbabwe put forward a National Renewable Energy policy in 2019. The policy aims to have 16.5% of the total generation capacity (exclusive of hydro) from renewable sources by 2025. Households mainly in high density suburbs have resorted to the use of

of solar photovoltaic (PV) systems mainly because the main power stations in Zimbabwe have failed to adequately supply the whole country with energy. Efforts are being made by various sectors to shift to solar energy, the Munyati Power station in Kwekwe has engaged into an enormous solar project which is still underway. A number of urbanites in Zimbabwe are excited and optimistic on the shift from hydro to solar as they perceive that this will address the energy problems the country has been facing for over a decade. There has been a notable increase in the purchase of solar powered gadgets including solar

lights, radios, cell phones and this has reduced a burden on the increase demand for coal generated electricity. Sustainable Climate Action Trust has an obligation to compliment all these efforts by the government, private sector and individuals by developing renewable energy projects in communities across the country with a vision of expanding to other countries as well.

World Elephant Day

Lady Diana

World Elephant Day was created in 2011 by two Canadian filmmakers, Patricia Sims and Thailand’s Elephant Reintroduction Foundation and was first celebrated on August 12, 2012. It was launched to make people aware of numerous serious threats facing Asian and African elephants. The African elephant is called Loxodanta Africana, whereas the Asian Elephant is called Elephas Maximus.

Interesting facts about elephants are that they are intelligent, family oriented, have great memory, have deep emotions from intense grief to joy, and are also very aggressive.

Celebrating World Elephant Day is an opportunity for every one of us to educate ourselves about elephants, their way of living, their importance to the society, as well to our cultures, and the environment. Elephants are considered endangered species. These creatures face multiple threated to their survival which comprise of habitat loss due to deforestation, population growth leading to shortages of forage, reduced rangeland, climate change, being brutally killed and poached for their ivory, and human elephant conflicts, just to mention a few. This is why it is essential to constantly recognize these

magnificent creatures to find ways to conserve and protect these elephants so that they do not go the way of the mammoth.

Elephants are essential to the society since they provide a source of food, medicine, foreign currency when ivory is traded, and boost government revenue, just to mention a few. As mega herbivores, they are great seed dispersers, maintain forest diversity and structure, and help combat climate change since they knock down smaller trees, paving way for the growth of larger trees which are huge sequesters of carbon dioxide. Hence, the three pillars of sustainability are worth mentioning which are, equity, economic and environmental sustainability. There have been international agreements, funds, conventions, and organisations in place that aim to protect and conserve these elephants so as to attain sustainable development.

Origins of the Celebration

World Giraffe Day (WGD) is an annual event that was set aside and was initiated by Giraffe Conservation Foundation (GCF) to celebrate nature’s tallest animal on the 21st June each and every year since 2014 to date.

Prior to the formation of this date, the GCF’s main mandate was to raise the flag of awareness on the protection of this outstanding creature Giraffe. Henceforth the day has been put on calendar and its observance began in 2014- present and several stakeholders have been making it a real success.

This year’s celebration (2022) For this annum, the GCF’s dedication and motion is, “Bringing Giraffe Back to Mozambique” Under the effects of the years of civil unrests in the Mozambique nation and across the region it has almost brought the Giraffe species to the brink of extinction and currently its reported to have only 250 giraffes left in the country and is an alarming concern on the wildlife ecology.

From their statement, the GCF mentions that. “We’re planning our most ambitious giraffe’s translocations EVER! Over the next 5 years, together with the Mozambique government and our partners, we are going to move over 350 giraffes to four key areas in the country: Zinave and Banhine National Parks, Maputo Special Reserve and Karingani Game Reserve”

This move will be significant, as it will translocate more than double the current population, hence re-establish the southern giraffe within its historic range and open up over 3 million acres of prime habitat for the giraffes to thrive.

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Therefore, within a good context, its not just the mere celebration of this creature but its an annual day to raise awareness and shed light on the challenges being faced in the wildlife.

In the year 2016, the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species’ status of giraffes changed to, “vulnerable to extinction” which became an alarming drop in their population particularly the Masai giraffe, with Africa’s population significantly dropped to about 30% over the last 30 years. This raises attention to the loss of wildlife, conservationist have observed the loss and some attributes include loss of the native habitat, poaching, wars, increase in the human settlements amongst other factors at hand.

wildlife refugees (learn more about our planet’s species from experts)

Interesting Facts About Giraffes

➢ They spend about 16-20 hours a day eating.

➢ They can sleep only 5 minutes a day.

➢ They have an excellent eyesight, able to spot a predator from a distance

➢ Newborns can stand about half an hour after birth and start to run within 10 hours

➢ They have a long tongue, can be stretched to 50cm.

➢ Females give birth to a single calf after 16 months

➢ While their neck is the longest, it has only 7 bones like humans and other mammals with much shorter necks. Some Proposed Ways to Conserve Giraffes

➢ Volunteer/Join- in conservation, find an organization that speaks to your passion and get involved and be a member. Actively support the organization to your best.

➢ Visit/Touring- Zoos, national parks and

➢

Donate when you visit nature reserves, pay the entry fees. Your donations help maintain these areas.

➢ Speak-up- share your passion for wildlife conservation with family and friends. Tell your friends how they can help.

➢ Restore- since habitat destruction is the main threat to 85% of all threatened and endangered species according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). We can help by planting trees, restoring wetlands, clean-up campaigns etc.

Conclusion

Generally, whether we are engaged in conservation of these species’ native habitats, finding time to hang out with nature’s wonders is quite worth it. Hence conserving wildlife for the coming generations is of prime importance as they form part and parcel of the wildlife environment and a value for our own recreation.

The information, opinions and views set out in this journal are those of the author (s) and do not necessarily reflect the official opinions of SAVE

ENVIRONMENT TRUST or any of their partners. Rights to the photographs and articles remain with the photographers and the authors respectively. While all care has been taken during proofing, errors and omissions may slip through and we sincerely apologies While all care has been taken during proofing, errors and omissions may we sincerely apologies