Mozambique has a variety of regional cropping patterns; agro-climatic zones range from

arid A region is arid when it severely lacks available water, to the extent of hindering or preventing the growth and development of plant and animal life. Regions with arid climates tend to lack vegetation and are called xeric or desertic. Most ...

and semi-arid (mostly in the south and south-west) to the sub-humid zones (mostly in the centre and the north) to the humid

highland Highlands or uplands are areas of high elevation such as a mountainous region, elevated mountainous plateau or high hills. Generally speaking, upland (or uplands) refers to ranges of hills, typically from up to while highland (or highlands) is ...

s (mostly the central provinces). The most fertile areas are in the northern and central provinces, which have high agro-ecological potential and generally produce agricultural surpluses. Southern provinces have poorer soils and scarce

rainfall Rain is water droplets that have condensed from atmospheric water vapor and then fall under gravity. Rain is a major component of the water cycle and is responsible for depositing most of the fresh water on the Earth. It provides water f ...

, and are subject to recurrent

drought A drought is defined as drier than normal conditions.Douville, H., K. Raghavan, J. Renwick, R.P. Allan, P.A. Arias, M. Barlow, R. Cerezo-Mota, A. Cherchi, T.Y. Gan, J. Gergis, D. Jiang, A. Khan, W. Pokam Mba, D. Rosenfeld, J. Tierney, an ...

s and

flood A flood is an overflow of water ( or rarely other fluids) that submerges land that is usually dry. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide. Floods are an area of study of the discipline hydrol ...

s.Mozambique Agricultural Development Strategy Stimulating Smallholder Agricultural Growth, The World Bank, February 23, 2006

Production

Mozambique produced, in 2018: * 8.5 million tons of

cassava ''Manihot esculenta'', commonly called cassava (), manioc, or yuca (among numerous regional names), is a woody shrub of the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae, native to South America. Although a perennial plant, cassava is extensively cultivated ...

(9th largest producer in the world); * 3 million tons of

sugarcane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of (often hybrid) tall, perennial grass (in the genus '' Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with stout, jointed, fibrous stalk ...

; * 1.6 million tons of

maize Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American English, North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples of Mexico, indigenous ...

; * 625 thousand tons of

sweet potato The sweet potato or sweetpotato ('' Ipomoea batatas'') is a dicotyledonous plant that belongs to the bindweed or morning glory family, Convolvulaceae. Its large, starchy, sweet-tasting tuberous roots are used as a root vegetable. The young ...

; * 578 thousand tons of

banana A banana is an elongated, edible fruit – botanically a berry – produced by several kinds of large herbaceous flowering plants in the genus ''Musa''. In some countries, bananas used for cooking may be called "plantains", disting ...

; * 343 thousand tons of tomatoes; * 273 thousand tons of

potato The potato is a starchy food, a tuber of the plant ''Solanum tuberosum'' and is a root vegetable native to the Americas. The plant is a perennial in the nightshade family Solanaceae. Wild potato species can be found from the southern Uni ...

; * 227 thousand tons of

coconut The coconut tree (''Cocos nucifera'') is a member of the palm tree family (Arecaceae) and the only living species of the genus ''Cocos''. The term "coconut" (or the archaic "cocoanut") can refer to the whole coconut palm, the seed, or the f ...

; * 138 thousand tons of

onion An onion (''Allium cepa'' L., from Latin ''cepa'' meaning "onion"), also known as the bulb onion or common onion, is a vegetable that is the most widely cultivated species of the genus '' Allium''. The shallot is a botanical variety of the on ...

; * 134 thousand tons of

rice Rice is the seed of the grass species '' Oryza sativa'' (Asian rice) or less commonly ''Oryza glaberrima'' (African rice). The name wild rice is usually used for species of the genera '' Zizania'' and '' Porteresia'', both wild and domesticat ...

; * 108 thousand tons of

cashew nuts The cashew tree (''Anacardium occidentale'') is a tropical evergreen tree native to South America in the genus '' Anacardium'' that produces the cashew seed and the cashew apple accessory fruit. The tree can grow as tall as , but the dwarf cul ...

(11th largest producer in the world); * 107 thousand tons of

peanut The peanut (''Arachis hypogaea''), also known as the groundnut, goober (US), pindar (US) or monkey nut (UK), is a legume crop grown mainly for its edible seeds. It is widely grown in the tropics and subtropics, important to both small an ...

; * 93 thousand tons of

tobacco Tobacco is the common name of several plants in the genus '' Nicotiana'' of the family Solanaceae, and the general term for any product prepared from the cured leaves of these plants. More than 70 species of tobacco are known, but the ...

; * 90 thousand tons of

sorghum ''Sorghum'' () is a genus of about 25 species of flowering plants in the grass family (Poaceae). Some of these species are grown as cereals for human consumption and some in pastures for animals. One species is grown for grain, while many other ...

; * 89 thousand tons of

cowpea The cowpea (''Vigna unguiculata'') is an annual herbaceous legume from the genus ''Vigna''. Its tolerance for sandy soil and low rainfall have made it an important crop in the semiarid regions across Africa and Asia. It requires very few inputs, ...

; * 85 thousand tons of

castor bean ''Ricinus communis'', the castor bean or castor oil plant, is a species of perennial flowering plant in the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae. It is the sole species in the monotypic genus, ''Ricinus'', and subtribe, Ricininae. The evolution of ...

; * 66 thousand tons of

pineapple The pineapple (''Ananas comosus'') is a tropical plant with an edible fruit; it is the most economically significant plant in the family Bromeliaceae. The pineapple is indigenous to South America, where it has been cultivated for many centuri ...

; * 65 thousand tons of

sesame seed Sesame ( or ; ''Sesamum indicum'') is a flowering plant in the genus '' Sesamum'', also called benne. Numerous wild relatives occur in Africa and a smaller number in India. It is widely naturalized in tropical regions around the world and is cu ...

; * 50 thousand tons of

beans A bean is the seed of several plants in the family Fabaceae, which are used as vegetables for human or animal food. They can be cooked in many different ways, including boiling, frying, and baking, and are used in many traditional dishes thr ...

; * 48 thousand tons of

cotton Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus '' Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, and can contain minor pe ...

; In addition to smaller productions of other agricultural products.

Farming Industry

With the large majority of agricultural production being rain-fed, weather variability is a major factor in determining crops performance. The main growing season starts with the first rains in September in the south and December in the north. There is also a minor growing season, based on residual soil moisture, from March to July, accounting for approximately 10 percent of total output. Agriculture is for the most part based on small, hand-cultivated units often farmed by women-headed households. About 97 percent of production comes from some 3.2 million subsistence farms averaging 1.2 hectares. The

smallholder A smallholding or smallholder is a small farm operating under a small-scale agriculture model. Definitions vary widely for what constitutes a smallholder or small-scale farm, including factors such as size, food production technique or technology ...

sector in Mozambique is characterized by holdings of multiple small plots, multiple

crop A crop is a plant that can be grown and harvested extensively for profit or subsistence. When the plants of the same kind are cultivated at one place on a large scale, it is called a crop. Most crops are cultivated in agriculture or hydropon ...

s, rain-fed water, traditional varieties, low intensity

fertilizer A fertilizer (American English) or fertiliser (British English; see spelling differences) is any material of natural or synthetic origin that is applied to soil or to plant tissues to supply plant nutrients. Fertilizers may be distinct from ...

and

pesticide Pesticides are substances that are meant to control pests. This includes herbicide, insecticide, nematicide, molluscicide, piscicide, avicide, rodenticide, bactericide, insect repellent, animal repellent, microbicide, fungicide, and ...

use and little or no

mechanization Mechanization is the process of changing from working largely or exclusively by hand or with animals to doing that work with machinery. In an early engineering text a machine is defined as follows: In some fields, mechanization includes the ...

, and low

productivity Productivity is the efficiency of production of goods or services expressed by some measure. Measurements of productivity are often expressed as a ratio of an aggregate output to a single input or an aggregate input used in a production proces ...

. Most

household A household consists of two or more persons who live in the same dwelling. It may be of a single family or another type of person group. The household is the basic unit of analysis in many social, microeconomic and government models, and is i ...

s diversify to cope with low productivity and

income Income is the consumption and saving opportunity gained by an entity within a specified timeframe, which is generally expressed in monetary terms. Income is difficult to define conceptually and the definition may be different across fields. Fo ...

. The majority practice extensive

shifting cultivation Shifting cultivation is an agricultural system in which plots of land are cultivated temporarily, then abandoned while post-disturbance fallow vegetation is allowed to freely grow while the cultivator moves on to another plot. The period of cu ...

, only about one-third sell any crop output, and almost two-thirds live in households that lack

food security Food security speaks to the availability of food in a country (or geography) and the ability of individuals within that country (geography) to access, afford, and source adequate foodstuffs. According to the United Nations' Committee on World ...

. Mozambique's surface or total area is 784.955kmq, i.e.: 78.5 million hectares. There are about 36 million

hectare The hectare (; SI symbol: ha) is a non-SI metric unit of area equal to a square with 100- metre sides (1 hm2), or 10,000 m2, and is primarily used in the measurement of land. There are 100 hectares in one square kilometre. An acre i ...

s of

arable land Arable land (from the la, arabilis, "able to be ploughed") is any land capable of being ploughed and used to grow crops.''Oxford English Dictionary'', "arable, ''adj''. and ''n.''" Oxford University Press (Oxford), 2013. Alternatively, for th ...

, suitable for agriculture. However, only ten percent of the arable land, 3.9 million hectares, is estimated to be cultivated. The remainder of the total area is under

pasture Pasture (from the Latin ''pastus'', past participle of ''pascere'', "to feed") is land used for grazing. Pasture lands in the narrow sense are enclosed tracts of farmland, grazed by domesticated livestock, such as horses, cattle, sheep, or sw ...

s (44 million ha) and

forest A forest is an area of land dominated by trees. Hundreds of definitions of forest are used throughout the world, incorporating factors such as tree density, tree height, land use, legal standing, and ecological function. The United Nations' ...

/woodlands (30.7 million ha) About 118,000 hectares are equipped for

irrigation Irrigation (also referred to as watering) is the practice of applying controlled amounts of water to land to help grow crops, landscape plants, and lawns. Irrigation has been a key aspect of agriculture for over 5,000 years and has been devel ...

, covering 3% of the potential land.FAO Statistic Yearbook 2010 – Resources, retrieved 9 May 2011 ;Crops Food crop production is the most important agriculture sub-sector accounting for around 80 percent of the cultivated area (2009).

Maize Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American English, North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples of Mexico, indigenous ...

and

are the major staples; other

food crop A crop is a plant that can be grown and harvested extensively for profit or subsistence. When the plants of the same kind are cultivated at one place on a large scale, it is called a crop. Most crops are cultivated in agriculture or hydropon ...

s include

millet Millets () are a highly varied group of small-seeded grasses, widely grown around the world as cereal crops or grains for fodder and human food. Most species generally referred to as millets belong to the tribe Paniceae, but some millets a ...

bean A bean is the seed of several plants in the family Fabaceae, which are used as vegetables for human or animal food. They can be cooked in many different ways, including boiling, frying, and baking, and are used in many traditional dishes th ...

groundnut Groundnut may refer to: * Seeds that ripen underground, of the following plants, all in the Faboideae subfamily of the legumes: ** ''Best Basketball Player'', Obinna Udunni ** ''Arachis villosulicarpa'', a perennial peanut species ** ''Vigna subt ...

es and a wide variety of

vegetable Vegetables are parts of plants that are consumed by humans or other animals as food. The original meaning is still commonly used and is applied to plants collectively to refer to all edible plant matter, including the edible flower, flowers, ...

s. Maize is grown in all regions of the country by about 79 percent of rural households and occupies about 35 percent of total planted area. Cassava is grown mainly in the north and south-east, where it is the main staple. This crop is an important component of the smallholder’s risk reduction strategy because it is drought tolerant and resistant to disease. Groundnut is cultivated on sandy soils in most locations and makes an important contribution to household diet and income. The main

cash crop A cash crop or profit crop is an agricultural crop which is grown to sell for profit. It is typically purchased by parties separate from a farm. The term is used to differentiate marketed crops from staple crop (or "subsistence crop") in subsist ...

s are

sesame Sesame ( or ; ''Sesamum indicum'') is a flowering plant in the genus ''Sesamum'', also called benne. Numerous wild relatives occur in Africa and a smaller number in India. It is widely naturalized in tropical regions around the world and is cul ...

sugar Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or do ...

and tea.

Tree crops In botany, a tree is a perennial plant with an elongated stem, or trunk, usually supporting branches and leaves. In some usages, the definition of a tree may be narrower, including only woody plants with secondary growth, plants that are u ...

, especially

and

cashew The cashew tree (''Anacardium occidentale'') is a tropical evergreen tree native to South America in the genus ''Anacardium'' that produces the cashew seed and the cashew apple accessory fruit. The tree can grow as tall as , but the dwarf cul ...

, grown by small farmers, are an important source of foreign exchange earnings, and contribute to household food security. ;Technology and Techniques The use of modern technologies and irrigation facilities is limited to a small number of commercial farms growing cash crops and vegetables and to out-growers of tobacco and cotton-producing crops on contract. Average crop yields are about half of the regional standard estimates indicating huge scope for improvement. Animal husbandry is an underdeveloped sector.

Cattle Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, cloven-hooved, herbivores. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus '' Bos''. Adult females are referred to as cows and adult ...

goat The goat or domestic goat (''Capra hircus'') is a domesticated species of goat-antelope typically kept as livestock. It was domesticated from the wild goat (''C. aegagrus'') of Southwest Asia and Eastern Europe. The goat is a member of the a ...

sheep Sheep or domestic sheep (''Ovis aries'') are domesticated, ruminant mammals typically kept as livestock. Although the term ''sheep'' can apply to other species in the genus '' Ovis'', in everyday usage it almost always refers to domesticate ...

and pigs are reared in extensive grass-based (

ruminant Ruminants (suborder Ruminantia) are hoofed herbivorous grazing or browsing mammals that are able to acquire nutrients from plant-based food by fermenting it in a specialized stomach prior to digestion, principally through microbial actions. The ...

s) or back-yard scavenger systems. There is, also a small fast-growing modern

poultry Poultry () are domesticated birds kept by humans for their eggs, their meat or their feathers. These birds are most typically members of the superorder Galloanserae (fowl), especially the order Galliformes (which includes chickens, qu ...

industry. In 2009, livestock accounted for 1.2 million of head of cattle, 4.5 million sheep and goats, 1.3 million pigs, and 18 million poultry. Beef production was estimated at 22,000 tons; pig meat, 91,000 tons; poultry meat, 22,000 tons; cows'

milk Milk is a white liquid food produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals (including breastfed human infants) before they are able to digest solid food. Immune factors and immune-modulat ...

, 75,000 tons; and hen eggs, 14 million. The high prevalence of disease is the main constraints undermining an increase in livestock numbers. For example, Newcastle disease is a major ubiquitous problem for poultry, in the northern provinces

tsetse Tsetse ( , or ) (sometimes spelled tzetze; also known as tik-tik flies), are large, biting flies that inhabit much of tropical Africa. Tsetse flies include all the species in the genus ''Glossina'', which are placed in their own family, Glos ...

flies affect cattle, and African swine fever affects pigs. The southern region is the heart of livestock activities because animals there are less prone to diseases.

Beyond Farming

In the fisheries sub-sector, some 1,500 species are believed to live in the Mozambican seawaters, of which 400 are of commercial importance. In 2008, captures of

fishery Fishery can mean either the enterprise of raising or harvesting fish and other aquatic life; or more commonly, the site where such enterprise takes place ( a.k.a. fishing ground). Commercial fisheries include wild fisheries and fish farms, ...

and

aquaculture Aquaculture (less commonly spelled aquiculture), also known as aquafarming, is the controlled cultivation ("farming") of aquatic organisms such as fish, crustaceans, mollusks, algae and other organisms of value such as aquatic plants (e.g. lot ...

production totalled 120,000 tons. The potential catch is estimated at 500,000 tons of fish. South African trawlers are allowed to fish in Mozambican waters in return for providing a portion of their catch to Mozambique. The European Community, Italy, and Japan have each entered into agreements designed to help develop the fishing industry.

Climate and Geography

Thick forest covers the wet regions, where there are fertile soils, but the drier interior, which has sandy or rocky soils, supports only a thin

savannah A savanna or savannah is a mixed woodland-grassland (i.e. grassy woodland) ecosystem characterised by the trees being sufficiently widely spaced so that the canopy does not close. The open canopy allows sufficient light to reach the ground to ...

vegetation. Extensive stands of hardwood, such as

ebony Ebony is a dense black/brown hardwood, coming from several species in the genus '' Diospyros'', which also contains the persimmons. Unlike most woods, ebony is dense enough to sink in water. It is finely textured and has a mirror finish when ...

, flourish throughout the country.

Wood Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulose fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin ...

production is from natural forests and is almost entirely consumed by the local rural populations for fuel and construction. Forests constitute an estimated 30.7 million hectares. In 2009, the

timber Lumber is wood that has been processed into dimensional lumber, including beams and planks or boards, a stage in the process of wood production. Lumber is mainly used for construction framing, as well as finishing (floors, wall panels, w ...

cut was approximately 36 million cu m.World Bank – Mozambique at a glance, 2/25/2011

References

Bibliography

* Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). Statistic Yearbook 2010. Text Online: http://www.fao.org/economic/ess/ess-publications/ess-yearbook/en/ * Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). Country Profiles – Mozambique. Text Online: http://www.fao.org/countryprofiles/index.asp?lang=en&ISO3=MOZ * Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). Emergency Mozambique Fact Sheet. Text Online: http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/tc/tce/pdf/Mozambique_factsheet.pdf * Food and Agriculture Organization/World Food Program (FAO/WFP). Special Report and Food Security Assessment Mission to Mozambique, 12 August 2010. Text Online: http://www.fao.org/docrep/012/ak350e/ak350e00.htm#3 * United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). International Human Development Indicators. Text Online: http://hdr.undp.org/en/statistics/ * The World Bank. Mozambique at a glance, 2/25/2011. Text Online: https://web.archive.org/web/20110721020914/http://devdata.worldbank.org/AAG/moz_aag.pdf * The World Bank. Mozambique Agricultural Development Strategy Stimulating Smallholder Agricultural Growth, February 23, 2006. Text Online: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/MOZAMBIQUEEXTN/Resources/Moz_AG_Strategy.pdf * African Development Fund (ADF). Mozambique 2006-09 Country Strategy Strategy Paper, April 2006. Text Online: http://www.afdb.org/fileadmin/uploads/afdb/Documents/Project-and-Operations/ADB-BD-WP-2006-47-EN-MOZAMBIQUE-CSP-2006-2009-REVISED-FINAL.PDF * Encyclopedia of the Nations, Mozambique. Text Online: http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Africa/Mozambique-FORESTRY.html * Waterhouse, Rachel. Vulnerability in Mozambique: Patterns, trends and responses, Paper presented to the IESE Conference Poverty Dynamics and Patterns of Accumulation in Mozambique, Maputo, 22–23 April 2009. Text Online: http://www.iese.ac.mz/lib/publication/II_conf/GrupoIV/Vulnerability_WATERHOUSE.pdf

Production

Farming Industry

Beyond Farming

Climate and Geography

References

Bibliography

See also