A moral compass that slipped: Indigenous knowledge systems and rural development in Zimbabwe

While African indigenous knowledge systems (IKS) remain one of the most valuable resources owned by rural people they have also been the least mobilized for sustainable development. Current development research and practice have witnessed a striking invisibility of IKS. The study adopted reflexive ethnography and utilised key informant interviews, informal or “irregular” focus group discussions, documentary evidence and individuals’ experiences in three purposively selected rural villages in Chivi district, southern Zimbabwe. Using examples from health, the study concludes that there has been a steady disaffection of IKS and practices as solutions to development woes. Besides exogenous factors, communities and individuals partly contribute to their own marginalisation and exclusion from mainstream development discourse. Rural people’s ways of learning, storing and transmitting knowledge have partly contributed to their own decimation as “knowledgeable” people often “ring fenced” their expertise or died without transferring it to next generations.