Green Dreams Organic Farming in East Africa

Gilgil is a town resting on the floor of the Great Rift Valley, about half an hours drive up towards Nakuru from famous Lake Naivasha. The land rises around the town in spectacular volcanic ridges upon which most of our small scale farmers in the area live.
Great volcanic soil enable farmers to produce without much need for artificial inputs, however, water is a problem. Whilst there are a few scenic dams and lush river valleys, due to the deforrestation in the Aberdares area, the rivers now run dry for most of the year.

Transporting products down these perilous ridges is also a huge challenge and is mainly done by bicycle, donkey and of late motorcycle. For large harvests like potatoes, lorries are used, and are more often seen stuck in the muddy gullies which become treacherous during the rain season.

Given the above senario, it’s not suprising that farmers struggling with all of these external factors and infrastructures remain poor most of the year.
In 2006 we took an Organic training program sponsored by BioVision to the farmers in Kigogo. We trained over 60 men and women on organic production emphasising the need to retain and build on soil fertility. Most of the farmers have a mixed cropping system which means there is availability of animal manures, however not all knew how to compost effectively, and some found it less laboursome to simply use artificial fertilizers. Given that an acre of land requires 4 tonnes of compost compared to 50kg of artificial fertilizer, what would you choose to apply under the blazing African sun?

Artificial fertilizers are lighter, can be applied quicker, and produce instant results. How do we then convince farmers that they should look at a more labour intensive and slower form of farming?
In Gilgil many cannot afford artificial fertilizers, so not alot of convincing was needed, just capacity building on effective composting.
No one will work excessively hard unless they get a good enough reward and thus, we set out to find markets for the products coming from the hills. Over the course of the past two years, we have had an intersting stream of organic products coming into our store The Organic Shop, the most famous of which is the Gilgil asparagus. This crop was originally identified due to it’s close resemblance to an indigenous weed in the area. It was soon seen as a cash crop and many farmers were taught how to produce it even though it takes 2 years from seed to viable production!!
When the international buyers eventually stopped purchasing and abandoned the crops, some farmers continued to grow it and began looking for local markets. So what has all of this got to do with rabitts???

Asparagus is harvested every day yet brought down to market every three days. It has a fairly good shelf life and is hardy when being transported (unlike pawpaws It has it’s own niche in the market place as no one else really grows the crop.Gilgil just has the perfect conditions.
It makes logical sense then to figure that if other products could find a niche, be exclusive and of high value, then perhaps all was not lost but rather about to begin for the farmers in the area.

During our training we talked about value addittion and gave examples of organic products including meats , most of our farmers have never been to Nairobi let alone into a supermarket and were very suprised to learn of the possibilities……………….but……………where would they get the knowledge?

About 6 months ago, an elderly man called me and said he wanted to talk to me about rabitts. I immediatly thought ‘Salamonella’!! I’d seen farmers with skinned rabbits in plastic bags festering in the sun at farmers markets .!! None-the-less and not to be put off, the old man and his daughter travelled to Nairobi to discuss the possibilities. I gave them as much information as I could about the cold chain, statutory labelling requirements, slaughter house hygiene etc. The old man asked me to put my requirements in writing, which I did and off they went. I felt mean as the obstacles were simply too high for these guys to meet up in the hills.

So I was pleasantly suprised when last week we recieved our first batch of rabitt meat samples!!! Frozen in half kg packets, labelled and looking very professional!!!

The couple had taken our recommendations to the Government and managed to get an entire project funded that now has 4 farmer groups growing 2000 rabitts!!! ……and not just any rabitts, serious hybrid types too from Denmark and California.

Yesterday we sent out our quality assurance expert Davis Nalika to do an assessment as well as to help the farmers improve on packaing details and as soon as this is done, Nairobi will have a supply of rabitt!!!

Asides from a serious feel good factor, I have learn’t never to underestimate an old farmer.

And I have just learnt that I have met my limit and cannot upload the photos. So have to figure this out but will definitely send some soon!!

On another topic got a mail this morning that said we were listed on Africas top 100 Best Blogs for learning about Africa. What an honour!!!

http://www.bachelorsdegreeonline.com/blog/2009/100-best-blogs-for-learning-about-africa/

The President of Kenya his Excellency Mwai Kibaki is soon set to sign a flawed Biosafety Bill that has caused much uproar and seen farmers in Kenya staging a week long campaign to stop the signing.

On the 22nd Dec farmers took the streets and staged peaceful demonstrations in the major cities of Nairobi, Machakos, and Kitale where they carried placards portraying their messages of discontent about the flawed Biosafety Bill to the President.
Petitioins are underway on the ground as well as online for concerned citizens of the world to assist the farmers in this cause. Dec 31st is the final day this year the Bill can be signed. Petitions will run up until the 27th before they are presented to the President.

Whilst aknowledging that a Biosafety Bill is indeed needed, the current Bill having been already passed in Parliament, does not cater for the following issues

1) There is no allocation for LABELLING of GMO ingredients on products .
Consumers will therefore have NO choice on whether they consumer GM products

2) There is inadequate measure of redress against any contamination, fall out etc in the Bill. Thus, should the environment or human health suffer as a consequence of GM products , Kenyans will have no way of getting adequate compensation according to the Bill as it stands today.

3)Finally , we at the Kenya Biodiversity Coalition believe the Bill has not involved the stakeholders in the industries it will impact upon. It was not based on an all inclusive transparent process, but rather a quick fast tracked bill which we feel is inadequate.

We would like to see the Bill taken back to the drawing board and only passed when the people of Kenya are both knowledeable and in agreement on its contents.

Please help us in our endeavours to STOP the Presdidential signing of this Bill until it is the best Biosafety Bill Kenya can produce.

To join our online petition, go to

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/3/stop-the-kenyan-president

Be part of something that is bigger than the sum of us all!!

Thanking all who stand up for our cause,

Su

THE GREAT DISCOVOREY
On 5th Sep 2007; at 8.00am I took the farm tractor mounted with the planter with a mission to do the craziest thing in the farm. To plant baby corn seeds in block m03; a block which was still green with vegetation having done the last frenchbeans harvest the previous day. Everyone that morning could not understand what I had woken up for. As I told the driver to move on, he reluctantly obliged, although you could tell from his eyes he was skeptical of the new planting system. I remember the then baby corn supervisor asking me in private that evening if I’m intending to deny them job by having a poor baby corn crop.
One year down the line the no till technology or zero tillage as my agronomy consultant Mr. Pierluigi Maggioni prefers to call it, has made a turn around to the production yield for baby corn and frenchbeans in Kantara farm. The average yields for baby corn shot up by over 40% while on beans by around 20%.This is on top of the savings that has been experienced with the reduction of fuel consumption by slightly over 75%per month. The labor cost has drastically reduced by over 50%. Weeds population has reduced to a manageable level. You don’t have to do any weeding on baby corn throughout the crop cycle if you have a post emergence herbicide done in time. On frenchbeans there’s only one weeding down from three at the late stage of the crop cycle. The incidences of pests and diseases have proportionally reduced to a normal threshold automatically reducing our sprays by a very good margin.
“No till technology is the way to go”, commented the agronomist while reacting to the new innovation. Most horticultural farms are still working on their soils with heavy machinery with a lot of investment. Although known to be an expensive business in terms of imputs; it’s the time for the policy makers in the industry to look for other ways of keeping the business profitable judging from the current economic handicaps that has hit hard on the business industry. With the current inflations, the cost of inputs is rising every other day while the market is still a challenge on competition and fluctuations of prices. No till can also be easily adoptable in the Organic Farming Sector which is rapidly gaining roots in the world’s food safety protocols. Despite the no till option being around in many parts of the world for several decades, not many of us are in touch with its possibility. More campaigns should also be put in place to promote such farming techniques to the benefit of business investors and even local community.This could add several other tones of produce in Kenya’s production accounts.

Jorum ndiritu
The writer is the Farm manager Kantara Farm (VEGPRO) – Thika

Note from Su:

It makes me happy to read this. Lets hope more exporters turn to this form of farming. Not only is it cost effective, more interestingly though less obvious, it is also a ’soil biota friendly’ method of production. ……………a stones throw away from organic production………..:)

Hello, this is Paula. I’m a guest blogger for Su. I wrote about this farm on my blog called Baraza at WildilfeDirect and on a blog about African innovations on Afrigadget and in both cases readers were amazed with what is happening in Kibera. I felt I had to follow up here.

Su called me to tell me that the sunflowers have opened! Recall that They were planted at the end of July using our seed planting gadget (a simple plastic water pipe with a twig taped at the end to create the hole and direct the seed while saving the planters from endless backaches) – I wrote about this and other innovations in Kibera on Afrigadget blog here. It had been months since I’d seen the farm, Peter (BBC Correspondent for East Africa) and I rushed over with Su to get photos knowing that the sight had to be spectacular. Don’t tell him but “Yes” we’re trying to get BBC interested in covering this wonderful positive story out of Africa

We met Abdulahi at the entrance of the farm which is nicely fenced – he had erected a sign banning all photographers!

I discovered that the sunflowers were there for a purpose, and it was not to beautify the farm. Earlier in this blog Su had mentioned slightly elevated levels of heavy metals in some parts of the shamba (farm). It turns out that sunflowers have a unique ability to extract zinc! It’s complicated interaction between the secretions from earthworms which causes the binding of heavy metals which in turn allows plants to take them up. Sunflowers are extraordinarily efficient at this.

The sad news is that you can’t eat the seeds or compost the leaves as this is where the zinc accumulates. The flowers and leaves sadly have to be burned (even though I’d love to take some home to adorn my living room).

The worm farm has evolved! Here’s the new look, a half barrel filled to the brim with material and worms. The litter around is about to go into the tank.

Su and Mohammed spent some time digging in to look at the little critters which were buried deep because the top few inches were quite dry. He was advised to add more water. The worms digest all the household and crop waste and every month the team pour water ontop of the entire tank and catch what comes out. The worm poo which is conveniently called ‘casts’ dissolves and out comes a nutritious brown liquid that is imaginatively called ‘worm tea’. Anyone for a cuppa?

The worms here are a peculiar blue colour …I hope it’s not a bad sign!

Someone on the afrigadget blog asked how the water for irrigation is paid for? Well, here’s the story. The youth reform group own a watertank and they provide a clean water service to anyone in the community. They sell water by the 20 litre jerrycan to anyone in the community. This generates the income needed to pay for the farm irrigation water.

We also heard how these ex criminals challenged a mafia like group up stream the previous week – these guys had disconnected water to the community of hundreds of thousands of people. I can only imagine the image of ex criminals walking over to the water control valve where they organized the permanent opening of the water supply line! The community was so pleased to have water again that all manner of in kind donations for the construction of the community center were received.

Here’s Abdulahi

Victor

And Moha

And here’s Su with the guys during the ‘inspection’

Ok, for some reason lay out is completely all over the place!

Dom just works silently in the background. He recently walked over 8 kilometers (he calls it a nice stroll) with the guys from Kibera to get the vermiculture tanks………..True to his nature he took pictures along the way, of all things interesting including an almost 500 meter bridge spanning a 20 meter wide road crossing………..why the bridge had to do this is anyones guess? AND FOLK JUST LOVE IT!!!

This is Dom

I believe in the saying ‘A river will always flow it’s course’………..no matter what we do, what we think , how we plan………….somethings take on a life of their own…………and now once a dangerous dump site our Organic Farm in Kibera is taking off in all sorts of directions.

Yesterday was the first commercial sale of product !! Totally awesome!!
So added to the advantages of food production, food security, environmental conservation, Youth Reform, we can now add INCOME GENERATION………….

Dominic has been keeping close tabs with the group and is largely responsible for their success. Hats off to you Dom!!
Yesterday whilst helping sort out the infrastructure for their vermiculture tanks, he managed to get these pictures of the group’s first commercial sale of kales and spinach.

The girl in the picture didn’t want her pic taken but the guys insisted as they are so totally proud of their farm

Notice the sunflowers growing with the crops. We’re hoping they will act as both a shade canopy as the weather heats up as well as a crop to help extract heavy metals within the soil. Today we are submitting leaf samples of all the crops (kales, cabbage, corriander, spinach and sunflower) for testing and will post the results asap.
Fingers crossed!!!!!

When I started this blog, I explained I was an absolute rookie to all things blogging. Today on showing Dominic the blog he reminded me to give an explanation on the dates on the first pictures. Actually, Wakio would be best to explain as she took the first pictures…………..It goes a bit like this……..we didn’t know how to adjust the date on the camera for a few weeks thus all the first pics are dated 2004!!

It really didn’t take 4 years to get this project off the ground though imagine if we took on a dump site the size of Dandora it just might!!

Happy reading………..:)

Su x

The Kibera Youth Reform Group transformed this garbage site

to this lush organic plot!!

105 days from start to harvest!!

The Kibera Youth Reform Organic Farm originally a 3 meter deep garbage dump, is finally only days away from harvest!! The transformation which started in April 2008 has taken a mere three and a half months, prooving anything is possible.
In April, Claire Niala came to me with a proposition. The Kibera Youth Reform Group, a group comprising 70 girls and guys in Kibera who had decided to change their ways of crime, requested assistance with an idea they had. They wished to transform a garbage site into a farm, growing crops for their own consumption as well as for sale if possible.

To begin with, I needed to see the area in question and my friend Wakio Seaforth went into Kibera with Mr Saidi one of the representatives of the group. She returned with the following pictures

From then until now the youth have worked at a terriffic pace to make their dreams come true. Assisted by Dominic Wanjihia who trained them in setting up their drip irrigation system, Johara who arranged the soil tests, Zak who assisted in the early days, Claire who made the connections, raised finance and guided the group with their finances and myself…mainly co-ordinating, planning and advising, the following pictures are a testimony to the youth groups hard work and success.