Spatial-temporal variability of natural resources at landscape level by smallholders farmers in three different settlement areas in Zimbabwe

During the colonial era in Zimbabwe 700,000 indigenous farmers were located on marginal lands, representing half of the country’s agricultural land; while 7,000 white farmers occupied the other half, on the best soils. In 1980 Zimbabwe got its independence and land reform started. To 2002, more than 232,000 indigenous families had been resettled in previously commercial farms under the land reform program. Debate still exists about the effects of land reform on the productivity of communal and resettlement areas, and on the landscape stability. In fact, the once so called 'bread basket of Southern Africa' now faces great problems to feed its own population due to a drastic drop in crop yields. Moreover, nearly 45% of its population is now considered malnourished. To date there is no quantitative biophysical information about how these agroecosystems have been affected by past land reform programs. Most of available literature refers to socio-economic impacts, and it is out of date. The main objective of this project is to quantitatively determine how land cover, land quality and land productivity vary spatially in the different settlement areas and how they have changed with time since resettlement. Therefore, three settlement areas from contrasting settlement periods (1960s, 1980s and early 2000) were identified and are being compared. Field sampling procedures, mid-infrared spectroscopy applications, remote sensing technologies, geographic information systems and geostatistic tools are being/will be used during the research. Local knowledge and participation of communities will be also vital for the assessment, as well as for planning a communal consensus about changes needed in future natural resource use and management.