Sustainability within Mafuro Farming
Mafuro Farming is the only large scale, commercial, free range pasture dairy in Zimbabwe. It is located southeast of Marondera, 95km east of Harare and is a very young business, having started its operations in 2018.
Safari Farm is the second site for the new and innovative farming model using open pasture for dairy cattle. This concept was initially started at the Grasslands Research Station in Marondera, which is currently being used mostly for rearing calves. As part of its expansion program, Mafuro Farming set up a third farm outside Kwekwe which started operating in April 2023. Prodairy is Mafuro Farming’s sole customer and started collecting milk from the farm in Kwekwe during the same month. The cattle using the Mafuro model are producing approximately 21 litres per cow, which is far above the national average of approximately 14 litres per cow.
Awards
During the year, the following accolades were received by Mafuro Farming:
Key Sustainability Highlights
- At East Range Farm, Mafuro Farming has implemented water conservation measures within the irrigation systems including the use of improved nozzles for better pivot efficiency.
- In addition, by irrigating according to specific area water requirements and during electricity off peak phases, energy requirements and costs have been reduced.
- Mafuro introduced the use of probiotics in all water sources in order to improve water quality, soil quality and plant roots.
- The Interherd Plus computer program is used by the Herd Health department to capture information on artificial inseminations serves, lactations, heifers, dams (mother cows), etc.
- Mafuro adopted the use of a mini incubator to test antibiotics in milk.
- 100% of the effluent is recycled and used as fertilisers on the pastures.
Note:
- For the historical data to be comparable, the Scope 1 Carbon Footprint for 2023 and 2022 has been recalculated using the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (UK) (DEFRA) factors for 2024.
- The Scope 2 carbon footprint decreased substantially since 2022 due to increased power outages experienced on the farms.
- The specific water usage increased markedly in 2024 due to the new farm in Kwekwe coming on line.
