GoMango

Our Mission is ...
To work with small scale family farmers to help allieviate poverty in rural areas through the production and marketing of agricultural crops in a manner sustainable for the environment and profitable for the farmers themselves.
Our Strategy is ...
To promote and support sustainable farming and living practices amongst subsistent farming communities, guided by the principles of organic farming. This will be achieved through hands-on education and training at the Gomango Ecology Center (GECO) in conjunction with strategically placed demonstration gardens amongst the farmers Associations to ensure the different climatic conditions and their respective needs are all covered. Gomango will provide markets for the crops grown and thus bring the small scale subsitence farmer into the cash economy.

The Issues ...
HIV/AIDS is devastating the rural areas. Currently Zimbabwe has the 2nd highest infection rate in the world with one in every four adults infected with HIV. Food production has been found to drop by 40% in households affected by HIV/AIDS as farmers and their families fall sick and are physically weakened, which in turn leads to less productivity.Communications between those with the knowledge and those without are limited as are discussion groups between farmers to share and pool local knowledge. Draft power is used by more than 85% of rural farmers in agricultural production. Due to HIV/AIDS the amount of cattle available for use as draft power are diminishing rapidly, cows are slaughtered in honour of the departed or are sold to take care of the sick. Many animals are poorly fed and used before they are mature enough for draft work which also greatly reduces the productivity of the animal. There is little doubt that markets are key for any business to survive and flourish. Little able to afford the inputs needed to farm in the first place, rural communities can not afford to transport their product to urban markets.
The issues ...
Access to funds in the form of loans are hard to come by as small scale subsitent farmers do not have title on their land and hence no collateral for a loan. So just to get started is very hard in the first place.