190 Trading forest products in South-Eastern Zimbabweretrenched urban workers. Just over half of the participants involved in
woodcarving are in this group.
Most participants in the craft sector are only partially involved, doing carving
or trading in crafts when other livelihood options fail or in seasons when
agricultural activities are less labour intensive. Generally, the ordinary households
from the communal area are well represented in the sector. The participants
interviewed gave no indication that certain kinds of households (in terms of
wealth status, for example) were dominating the craft sector.
The distribution of market participants is somewhat skewed. Sese Craft
Center, some 50 km from Masvingo, is the biggest and oldest market along the
Masvingo–Beitbridge road, comprising 28% of all participants. The four next largest
markets constitute 57% of the participants. The number of participants at each
market was positively correlated to the volume and level of product diversity.What is traded in these markets?
In the 1960s market stalls along the Masvingo–Beitbridge road in Chivi District
were mostly pottery outlets. The main resource, clay, is found on termite
mounds close to most homesteads. However, as buyers acquired new tastes
from markets in Harare and Bulawayo, stone carvings were introduced in 1976
at the Masvingo Craft School (which later became defunct). Stones found at
most local sites, e.g. Chikofa, were less suited for carving so carvers travelled
more than 50 km to collect good stones in Mashava or Zvishavane. However,
this distance and the associated transportation costs became prohibitive for
most people and thus it became common to substitute stone carvings with
wood. At the beginning of the 1980s the marketing of woodcrafts began to
gain prominence at Sese Craft Center.Photo 2. A woodcarving market in Chivi district, Zimbabwe trading Afzelia
quanzensis and Combretum imberbe products (Photo by Wavell Standa-Gunda)11woodcarving.p65 190 22/12/2004, 11:05