Story by Tafara Chikumira
GWERU-A cotton ginnery has been resuscitated in Gweru, in a major milestone that will see stakeholders in the southern parts of the country significantly benefit.
The country’s industrialisation drive continues to gain momentum, with the reopening of a cotton ginnery signalling renewed hope for southern region farmers and players in the cotton value chain.
The Southern Cotton Company, Zimbabwe’s second-largest cotton producer, has revived operations at the formerly defunct ginnery, which had closed in 2016.
The plant resumed operations last week following its acquisition in 2023.
“We started ginning last week. So far, we have a total of 3 000 tonnes of cotton at the site. For this season, we are anticipating reaching around 5 000 tonnes, and we already have export markets for our lint. We are very excited about the developments happening here,” Southern Cotton, Managing Director, Mr Caos Nzenze said.
The revived ginnery has brought transformative change to the local community, with residents and service providers already experiencing the positive impact.
“I am very excited to have been employed at this company. As a single mother, I can now send my children to school and pay my rentals without difficulties,” one employee said.
“I look after an extended family. Thanks to this job, I have managed to move my family into town and am now helping youths in my suburb find employment. Crime has gone down as more people find jobs,” a beneficiary said.
“As transporters, business was generally slow, however, since this firm began operations, we are getting more business, which is commendable,” a transporter said.
Southern Cotton Company is now focused on expanding cotton production to match the processing capacity of its facilities, with a renewed push towards contract farming.
“For the Southern region, this season we managed to plant 1 000 hectares. However, we intend to improve our own production capacity and we want to ride on the new hybrids, which are producing higher yields on small pieces of land. We also intend to ride on our outgrowers scheme where we intend to contract every household with inputs enough to cater for a 1 hectare plot,” Operations and Production Director, Mr Saimanos Zhou said.
Southern Cotton has established three processing plants nationwide, each with the capacity to process up to 100 tonnes of cotton per season.
This latest development is expected to further stimulate growth in the agriculture and manufacturing sectors, in line with Vision 2030.
