For many researchers, funders, and development partners working in agriculture, conversations about transformation often begin with food systems: improving production, strengthening value chains, or expanding markets. While these are critical priorities, they represent only a fraction of the complex reality. Agriculture does not exist in isolation. It is deeply embedded within landscapes shaped by interconnected water systems, ecosystems, climate dynamics, institutions, and communities. When interventions focus exclusively on food production, the broader ecological and social dynamics that ultimately determine whether those systems succeed or fail are frequently overlooked.
This narrow focus has historically led to fragmented, sector-based responses to interconnected challenges such as food insecurity, biodiversity loss, land degradation, and climate vulnerability. For decades, investments have often pursued productivity, conservation, or climate mitigation in isolation. Consequently, these siloed approaches have frequently resulted in unintended trade-offs, where gains in agricultural yield undermine ecosystem health or water availability. The core challenge has not been a lack of solutions, but the absence of systems thinking and integrated approaches capable of managing these trade-offs and unlocking synergies at the scale where these challenges intersect: the landscape.
This broader perspective was reaffirmed during the recent Science–Policy dialogue on Climate-Resilient Agrifood Systems Transformation in Zimbabwe held in Harare. Building on the earlier Review of Zimbabwe’s Agricultural Policy Priorities Workshop, the dialogue brought together policymakers, researchers, and practitioners to reflect on how Zimbabwe can move from policy ambition to implementation. What emerged from both engagements was not that Zimbabwe lacks policy direction, but that the next critical step lies in strengthening coordination around how existing policy priorities are operationalised.
Zimbabwe currently possesses fit-for-purpose policy frameworks designed to guide agrifood transformation. National strategies, notably the Agriculture, Food Systems and Rural Transformation Strategy 2 (AFSRTS-2) for 2026-2030 and the National Development Strategy 2 (NDS2), explicitly recognise the interconnected roles of agriculture, water, natural resources, climate resilience, rural livelihoods, and social inclusion. Multifunctionality is, therefore, not absent from policy thinking. At first glance, some sectoral priorities within these frameworks may appear to pull in different directions, but this does not point to weak policy design. Rather, it highlights the urgent need for better coordination in operationalisation.
This is where the concept of Multifunctional Landscapes (MFL) becomes highly relevant. The challenge is not to introduce an entirely new framework, but to utilise MFL as a coordination lens for implementing policies across sectors that already share common development goals. A multifunctional landscapes approach helps shift attention from isolated sectoral delivery to shared outcomes within the same geographical space. It encourages stakeholders to view landscapes as complex, interlinked social-ecological systems where ecological processes, production systems, governance arrangements, markets, and social relations converge.
Operationalising AFSRTS-2 and NDS2 requires strategic entry points that address Zimbabwe’s specific vulnerabilities while leveraging new opportunities. The dialogue highlighted several critical enablers that must be integrated within the MFL framework:
Irrigation Development in response to climate variability: The drier regions of Zimbabwe experience drought in three out of every five years, a frequency exacerbated by climate change and intense El Niño events. Irrigation must be approached not merely as infrastructure expansion, but as an integrated component of water governance, energy use, ecosystem sustainability, and community resilience.
Digital Tools and Artificial Intelligence: Advanced technologies offer significant opportunities for optimising agricultural practices. AI and digital advisories can support the cultivation of opportunity crops that are drought-tolerant, providing farmers with timely information on climate, pests, and production. These tools are essential for monitoring landscape health and supporting decision-making in highly variable environments.
Unlocking opportunities for women and youth: Resilient agrifood systems cannot be built while key actors remain constrained. As food systems formalise, youth employment in traditional agriculture often declines. Drawing insights from the CGIAR Agroecology Initiative, interventions must focus on creating sustainable enterprises and off-farm employment within agricultural value chains, particularly for young women. This requires deliberate inclusion in access to land, finance, technology, and decision-making processes.
Production stability and nutrition security: Climate-resilient crops, particularly small grains, indigenous crops, and diversified cropping systems, must be evaluated beyond yield performance. Their integration into local food systems impacts markets, processing capabilities, and community nutrition, contributing to overall production stability.
Climate finance for sustainability incentives: The real challenge is often not the absolute absence of funding, but the capacity to access and structure it around transformation priorities. Climate finance must be aligned to incentivise sustainable practices, such as soil carbon sequestration and biodiversity conservation, providing tangible economic benefits for communities adopting regenerative approaches.
Operationalising NDS2 through the MFL thinking requires clear pathways that demonstrate what needs to be done, how it should be achieved, and who must be involved. The CGIAR Multifunctional Landscapes Science Program, which includes Zimbabwe as a strategic country, offers a practical blueprint for this transition. The key point is that agrifood transformation happens in real places, shaped by real interactions between land, water, ecosystems, markets, and people. Those interactions need to be managed intentionally. The pathways for implementation involve several key components:
Firstly, establishing landscape-level rules of engagement and coordination platforms. These do not require entirely new institutions but involve creating shared evidence systems and joint planning processes that help different actors align around common outcomes. Secondly, prioritising capacity building and knowledge management. There is a critical need to translate scientific research into practical toolkits for farmers and extension officers. Training must explicitly link agroecological principles with regenerative practices, ensuring land managers can assess soil health and evaluate the economic returns of their interventions.
Thirdly, engaging in policy coherence and interaction analysis. This involves deliberately examining where policies reinforce one another, where implementation mandates overlap, and where coordination is necessary to manage trade-offs and build synergies. Finally, implementation must occur at scale, guided by the 13 interconnected agroecological principles promoted by the CGIAR Agroecology Initiative. This system’s approach ensures that interventions manage trade-offs across production systems, biodiversity conservation, and social equity.
Ultimately, operationalising NDS2 and AFSRTS-2 through a multifunctional landscapes approach is not about replacing what already exists. It is about providing a coherent, systems-based methodology for implementing what is already there. If national strategies provide the development direction, then MFL offers the most robust blueprint for turning that ambition into coordinated, resilient action on the ground.
Facts Only
* Conversations about agricultural transformation often begin with food systems: improving production, strengthening value chains, or expanding markets.
* Agriculture is embedded within landscapes shaped by water systems, ecosystems, climate dynamics, institutions, and communities.
* Siloed approaches to challenges like food insecurity, biodiversity loss, land degradation, and climate vulnerability have led to unintended trade-offs.
* The challenge is the absence of systems thinking capable of managing trade-offs and unlocking synergies at the landscape scale.
* The Science–Policy dialogue in Zimbabwe reflected on moving from policy ambition to implementation.
* Zimbabwe possesses policy frameworks such as AFSRTS-2 (2026-2030) and NDS2 that recognize interconnected roles of agriculture, water, natural resources, climate resilience, rural livelihoods, and social inclusion.
* Irrigation must be approached as an integrated component of water governance, energy use, ecosystem sustainability, and community resilience in response to climate variability.
* Digital tools like AI can support cultivation of drought-tolerant crops by providing timely information on climate, pests, and production.
* Interventions must focus on creating sustainable enterprises and off-farm employment for young women within agricultural value chains.
* Climate finance must align with sustainability incentives such as soil carbon sequestration and biodiversity conservation.
* Operationalizing NDS2 through MFL requires establishing landscape-level rules of engagement and coordination platforms.
* Implementation pathways involve establishing shared evidence systems, prioritizing capacity building linking agroecology with regenerative practices, policy coherence analysis, and implementation guided by 13 interconnected agroecological principles.
Executive Summary
Conversations about agricultural transformation often start with improving production, value chains, or market expansion, but this focuses only on a fraction of the reality. Agriculture is embedded within interconnected landscapes defined by water systems, ecosystems, climate dynamics, institutions, and communities. Narrow focus on food production historically led to fragmented responses that resulted in trade-offs, where gains in yield undermined ecosystem health or water availability. The core challenge has been the lack of systems thinking needed to manage these trade-offs across the landscape.
The Science–Policy dialogue in Zimbabwe highlighted that while policy frameworks exist recognizing interconnected roles, the next step is strengthening coordination on how existing priorities are operationalized. Policy strategies like AFSRTS-2 and NDS2 acknowledge the interconnectedness of agriculture, water, climate resilience, livelihoods, and social inclusion. The concept of Multifunctional Landscapes (MFL) is proposed as a lens to shift focus from isolated sectoral delivery to shared outcomes within the geographical space.
Operationalizing these strategies requires integrating specific areas: managing irrigation as part of water governance and ecosystem sustainability; leveraging digital tools like AI for climate-resilient cultivation; ensuring inclusion by focusing on youth and women in value chains; prioritizing production stability through diversified systems; aligning climate finance to incentivize sustainability measures; and using MFL principles to establish coordination platforms, capacity building, policy coherence analysis, and scaled implementation guided by agroecological principles.
Full Take
The narrative pivots on a necessary cognitive shift: moving from siloed sectoral interventions to understanding the landscape as a complex, socially-ecological system. The pattern observed is that technical solutions (like yield optimization or climate mitigation) fail when divorced from the ecological and social realities of the physical space where they occur. The persistence of fragmented responses stems from an institutional habit of operating within discrete administrative boundaries rather than shared spatial realities.
The introduction of Multifunctional Landscapes (MFL) acts as a conceptual bridge, attempting to impose a systems-based methodology onto existing, though often contradictory, policy structures like AFSRTS-2 and NDS2. The implication here is that the failure is not in the ambition of the policies, but in the operational mechanism—the lack of intentionality in managing externalities and synergies across boundaries.
A key tension emerges between ambitious top-down policy frameworks and the bottom-up reality of embodied knowledge required for on-the-ground success. The proposed solution requires layering coordination mechanisms (rules of engagement, shared evidence) over existing structures rather than wholesale replacement. This suggests a recurring dynamic where institutional change is often slower than conceptual framing; there is a pattern of theoretical integration preceding operational alignment.
The move toward agroecology principles and specific interventions—such as valuing diversified systems for nutrition security or prioritizing women’s roles in employment—demonstrates an awareness that ecological health is inseparable from social equity. The real systemic pressure is to dismantle the historical prioritization of production metrics above holistic ecosystem management, demanding a rethinking of what constitutes "success" in development.
What evidence exists for the capacity to shift from sectoral silos to MFL coordination? What forms of institutional resistance typically block the integration of empirical ecological knowledge into formal governance structures? How can the pursuit of efficiency within existing administrative structures be leveraged to create genuine, horizontal synergies across these interconnected systems rather than simply layering new oversight mechanisms?