Strategies of coping with the effects of HIV/AIDS in Chinamhora communal lands, Goromonzi rural district, Zimbabwe

Abstract

This qualitative study assesses the impacts of HIV/AIDS on rural households in Chinamhora communal lands, explores the coping strategies of these rural households and establishes possible interventions towards improving their coping strategies. The study comes at a time when deaths from HIV/AIDS have reduced dramatically in Zimbabwe and beyond, yet people in rural areas continue to be highly predisposed to HIV-related illness and death. A case study design was used in this study and the researcher selected a sample of 61 household heads using convenience sampling. Participants were interviewed and the collected data were analysed through the  NVivo software package. The findings were then presented in line with the themes that emerged from data analysis. Participants of the study highlighted various impacts of HIV/AIDS on their households, particularly in line with their agricultural activities, the decline in household income and social marginalisation. They also illustrated the strategies that they use to cope with the effects of HIV/AIDS. The research, in response, identified feasible interventions towards strengthening these coping strategies, with the reinforcement of informal home-based care and the expansion of social protection programmes to the rural community being some of them.

Keywords: agriculture, coping strategies, communal areas, HIV and AIDS, household income, rural households