Ministry overview | |
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Formed | May 1980 |
Jurisdiction | Government of Zimbabwe |
Headquarters | Harare |
Minister responsible |
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Deputy Ministers responsible |
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Child agencies |
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The Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) is a government ministry responsible for agriculture in Zimbabwe, including the management of agricultural land use, but not land reform. Dr Anxious Jongwe Masuka is the incumbent Minister of Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement, having been appointed on 14 August 2020. [1] Currently, the deputy ministers are Douglas Karoro and Vangelis Haritatos. The ministry is located in Harare.
The ministry oversees:
State corporations under the direction of the Ministry of Agriculture include: [2]
Minister | Start of term | End of term |
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Denis Norman | May 1980 | July 1985 |
Moven Mahachi [3] | 1985 | 1988 |
David Karimanzira | 1987/1988 | 1990 |
Witness Mangwende | 1 January 1991 | 22 December 1994 |
Kumbirai Kangai | 1994 | 2000 |
Joseph Made | 2000 | 2007 |
Rugare Gumbo | 2007 | 2009 |
Sylvester Nguni (acting) | 2009 | 2009 |
Joseph Made | 13 February 2009 | 27 November 2017 |
Perrance Shiri [4] [5] | 30 November 2017 | 27 July 2020 |
Anxious Jongwe Masuka [6] | 14 August 2020 | Incumbent |
Land reform in Zimbabwe officially began in 1980 with the signing of the Lancaster House Agreement, as a program to redistribute farmland from white Zimbabweans to black Zimbabweans as an effort by the ZANU-PF government to give more control over the country's extensive farmlands to the black African majority. Before the implementation of these policies, the distribution of land in what was then known as Rhodesia saw a population of 4,400 white Rhodesians owning 51% of the country's land while 4.3 million black Rhodesians owned 42%, with the remainder being non-agricultural land. The discrepancy of this distribution, as well as the overall dominance of the white population in the newly-independent but largely unrecognized Rhodesian state was challenged by the black nationalist organizations ZANU and ZAPU in the Rhodesian Bush War. At the establishment of the modern Zimbabwean state in 1980 after the bush war, the Lancaster House Agreement held a clause that prohibited forced transfer of land, this resulted in changes in land distribution from the willing sale or transfer by owners being minor until 2000, when the government of Robert Mugabe began a more aggressive policy.
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