ABSTRACT
The importance of personally-owned equipment to cultivate the land varies between the two schemes. In Mvura the land is ploughed by tractor so that plotholders have no need of ploughs and oxen. In Zuva, however, each plotholder has to plough his own land. Although the average family of plotholders on the Mvura and Zuva irrigation schemes has about three members who can contribute to work in the fields, labour input differs greatly in these communities. The different labour input is partly dictated by the different requirements of overhead and flood irrigation, by the larger acreage at the disposal of Mvura plotholders and by their additional cotton crop; but it is also due to the different attitude of the people towards agricultural labour. In addition to putting much labour into crop production, Mvura plotholders also spend about an hour a day throughout the year on their vegetable gardens and orchards.
