CCARDESA conducted the Information, Communication and Knowledge Management workshop in Harare, Zimbabwe on 21st March 2019. The main purpose of the workshop was to promote the CCARDESA website to the government representatives, researchers, information officers, local non-government organizations, private sector actors and farmer organizations. These stakeholders were invited due to their daily use of agricultural information in their jobs and that they can benefit from using the CCARDESA SAAIKS Knowledge Hub. Conversely, these stakeholders are well positioned to provide country specific input into the CCARDESA knowledge hub.
The meeting was well attended with representation from the Ministry of Agriculture and Mechanization. Mr Shingirayi Nyamutukwa the manager from the Department of Research and Specialist Services gave the opening remarks where he highlighted the importance of sharing information regarding agriculture and climate change. He mentioned the importance of climate change information and how critical it is for people to have so that they can be alert of what is happening in the climate. He specifically referred to the Cyclone Idai which devasted Mozambique and eastern Zimbabwe earlier this month, he indicated that early and accurate information can assist people in preparing for such events in the future . He urged participants to make use of the CCARDESA website to both access and upload content.
During the workshop, the participants were provided the chance to navigate the system to assess how much information is available about Zimbabwe and were saddened to discover that this information was lacking. The participants vowed to populate the CCARDESA Knowledge Hub with information so that other SADC member states could benefit from the research that is being undertaken in Zimbabwe.
The enthusiastic participants also discussed the need to translate technical agricultural research into audience friendly content that can be understood by extension workers and farmers at the grassroots level. CCARDESA is excited and looks forward to Zimbabwe translating research to benefit farmers from across the SADC Region through engaging with the CCARDESA ICKM System.
