The Nyachityu Water Harvesting and Gulley Reclamation project was centered around securing a water source which could be used in the afforestation programme, in horicultural ativities and for domestic purposes.The main activities included construction of the weir, gulley reclamation, conservation farming and the establishment of live fencing.The project has accomplished the following:

1) TRAINING PROGRAMME
In November 1994, the group arranged for an educational tour to an intensive utilisation project in Mutasa District which runs a market garden with overhead irrigation and have 10 fish ponds. This helped the group to network and exchange information on proper land-use systems.

The group received a series of training workshops on natural resources management and catchment protection, agro-forestry approaches, beekeeping and nursery establishment. As a result of the awareness raised from the workshops, they came up with their local by-laws on managing their forests and this was spearheaded by the local leadership especially Chief Marange. Due to their ability to monitor their forests, there has been a signficant improvement of the forest ecosystem and this project has even won some of the conservation competitions held at provincial level.

2) WEIR CONSTRUCTION
The weir was completed in May 1995 and has a capacity of 37 000 cubic litres. The most successful impact of the Nyachityu project has been provision of water which has helped to change the ecosystem down-stream. Through construction of the weir, the stream now flows all year round, the vegetation has been rejuvinated and availability of water has enabled the communities to engage in horticultural production and fish farming. In addition the group managed to grow the vegetables for a while for sale in markets abroad.

However, their continued sale of vegetables was interrupted by government take over of the farming area and as a result has not been able to keep up the outgrowers scheme. As a result this marketing outlet was affected since government failed to inherit and efficiently manage this outlet. To this end the farmers concentrate on growing vegetables for the local market.

3. CATCHMENT PROTECTION
Following the completion of the dam wall construction, the catchment perimeter fencing was done in an area covering a square kilometre upstream in June 1995. The activities completed under catchment protection include:

i) Woodlot Management
Five thousand eucalyptus seedlings were planted in the nursery plot during 1994-1995 rain season. However, the adverse weather conditions made it difficult for all of the seedlings to be trans-planted into the catchment area. Apart from growing eucalyptus trees, the community decided to diversify and raised indigenous species. A total of 6000 plants of varous species were planted in the nursery plot.

ii) Vertiva grass planting
Vertiva grass is under propagation along the stream and some has been distributed amongst the members to plant in their homesteads and reduce erosion.

4) PROJECT IMPACT AND SUSTAINABILITY
The project has attracted a lot of government departments, NGOs and other interested parties involved in similar natural resource management projects. These include the Zimbabwe Republic Police, District Development Fund, Africa University, Glen-Forest Training Center, AREX and the Canadian Dvelopment Agency. The project has had an opportunity to be recognized by the Africa University as one of its Research Study Area.

In addition, the project has managed to bring direct benefits to the community in providing water for domestic use, livestock watering and horticultural activities. It has also been a great learning place for as a number of training workshops have been carried out at the project. The school in the community has also benefitted in that they received 50 indigenous seedlings of 8 different species for their tree planting day.

The group has been one of the best practice cases and this has resulted in the replication of these activities in places like Chamakareva which falls in the same district.