Green Dreams Organic Farming in East Africa

The cows came home the other evening whilst preparing for a presentation. It suddenly dawned on me that what I had been trying to articulate for years was staring me in the face. It’s simple really. Imagine this……….you need a bus driver to carry commuters from A to B. Which of the two senario’s would you follow…..pick a guy off the street and give him a set of bus keys and a map….no , forget the map, just the keys……….or ……look for a guy who could drive and failing to find any, get someone trained tested and approved before giving him a map from A to B and letting him take charge of your bus.

Supposing we went with the first option. Imagine the chaos, the risk and the failure of anyone in getting from A to B alive let alone on time. No one in their right mind would do this. And possibly few who were mindless too. Yet, this in a nut shell is why we suffer from famine in much of Africa.

It all stems around the fact that a) We have been lucky and b) We have misappropriated the word ‘farmer’ or rather , perhaps confused ourselves (as well as development agencies) into believing we are a continent of farmers.

We have been lucky for many reasons
1. Our continent lies in a strategic zone, enabling us to grow crops most months of the year
2. We have had an abundance of rainfall
3. Parts of our continent have super soils
4. We have alot of labor

Misappropriating the term ‘farmer’.
The ‘farmers’ in most of the developing world are like the unskilled bus driver in my earlier analogy. In Africa we define a farmer as being someone who works the land to produce agri products. In most parts of Europe the term used is ‘Field hand’.

A farmer in most of Europe is defined as a person who has been trained, is armed with a certificate of sorts and can use this to leverage benefits from their Government. Subsidies etc. Their Governments invest in them as they are the food producers for the nation. And if they were to disappear what then? They are assets to the country.

How many farmers in Africa are trained? If we have had any training at all it is at the agro dealer shop where we buy our inputs. We are given seed, the fertilizers to grow them with, and the pesticides to kill the bugs that feast on our crops. But how many of us know more than that? About the workings of the crops, the needs, how to identify the problems they have. How many of us know about the soils?

Back to my earlier analogy, if the unskilled and skilled bus drivers have no idea how to change tyres or do basic maintenance on the bus they drive, they will always have to have a mechanic either on board or on stand by. Another expense. In our AFrican agriculture, this mechanic is the agro dealer, who may or may not be a practitioner but who will definitely sell you something. It’s in his interest.

As for our Governments, we have been lucky to a degree in that with the little skills we have we have managed to feed our nations in the past however, as our countries ‘develop’ farmers are downing their tools and joining the ‘real work’ train. It’s logical, given the option of breaking your back in the hot sun, playing russian roulette with your life based on the changing weather patterns, taking risk after risk after risk……..or the option of a ‘job’, any job that is less arduous, what would YOU choose? Farming in Africa as it stands today is possibly the hardest job on the planet, and the riskiest too.

It’s no wonder farming is failing in Africa. We’re not really farmers after all. We are survivors. Largely depending on ‘shauri ya mungu’ (the will of God) and our mechanics, the agro dealers.
And if we are given another option to survive, we will jump at it. So in a nutshell development on the one hand is perhaps causing famine as ‘farmers’ flock to the ever growing towns and cities funnily enough, in search of greener pastures ( that inevitably turn out to be concreted chaotic jungles).

Now that I feel we have a root to the problem, what can be done to turn it around? How do we make farming sexier, less risky, and something people want to do rather than wish to get away from?

Next post coming up. I have an idea

Beyond the brilliance of their innovations, innovators need to have characters made of steel. Implementation and scaling of an innovation requires cash,which is often in short supply when most needed. The word out is that an innovation without a working prototype is simply an idea. And everyone has a bright idea right?
Wrong.
Most people do not have bright ideas.

On the topic of cash, due to this warped idea that assumes everyone in the world to be a passive brilliant innovator, real innovators have to jump through hoops time and time again in their struggle to get funding to show the ‘idea’ is in fact doable, through the all allusive proof of concept in a working prototype.

Welcome to the vicious cycle faced by innovators every day.

The newest kid on the block, attracting innovators by the droves is the Innovation Competition ilk. Luring innovators into a bevy of competitions with attractive irresistible prizes ranging from USD 2,000 to USD 1,000,000! . Naturally this is an extremely attractive proposition to someone who otherwise is unable to raise funding to develop the ‘working prototype’.
And this is where innovators are either propelled into success or failure, baring their souls in the process to an ecosystem and environment that is often on a different wave length. And this is where I recommend innovators need to be cautioned into going into these competitions with guts of steel.

Innovators the world over have one thing in common. They and their innovations are often not understood by the average layman (the one with all the bright ideas). These competitions however, pit them into a process where they will be judged by the same. And perhaps this is where the dilemma lies.

I have a few tips for innovators entering these competitions.

1. Do not be afraid to ask the competition organisers for a bio on each of the judges.
2. Ensure that at least one of the judges is an expert in your field
3. Enquire how many hours of due diligence will be given to each entrant

From experience I have seen that this is critical in ensuring that your innovation gets equal viewing as well as understanding. Judges often do not understand the subject matter nor do they investigate fully the innovative claims of entrants. They are mortals like you and me and they have a day job.

If you are unable to extract this info from the competition organisers and are still attracted to the prize money, making a few judgements of your own will at least give you an idea of what to expect.

1. Look closely at the time between the competition closing and the finalist being announced. When the dates are very close together, be ready for some interesting shocks. This competition is as good as entering the lottery. And your guess is as good as mine on protection of your IP

2. If the competition is an annual event as many are, search for info on past winners. Have they disappeared into oblivion or are they now budding enterprises? Your choice

In a nutshell, some competitions should be avoided or at least entered into with eyes wide open and guts of steel. Many companies and organisations use competitions for their own agenda, marketing, advertising, CSR etc.

So why the cockroach and rat analogy. ?

In a recent themed competition I entered,there were 458 entrants. The competition sought to highlight and promote scalable and replicable solutions to Africas burning problems. Entrants ranged from solar solutions, education solutions, green tecnologies, solutions in agriculture etc etc.

I am still wondering if the Africa I know and the Africa known by the judges were two different continents considering one of the top prizes went to a solution to eradicate cockroaches and rats from our awesome continent. This implies one of two things, 1) Africa is indeed infested with cockroaches and rats or 2) The judges failed to do their due diligence.

I suspect the latter.

Going forward with eyes open and guts of steel, I will ask the questions next time. If I feel I have an innovative solution that can create impact for my continent and am prepared to spend time and effort filling in documents, attending interviews and days in competition conferences as a dedicated innovator, then frankly I expect, and am prepared to demand the same professionalism from the judges.

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!!!!!

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.

Dominic always impresses me. No two things are done the same way if he has anything to do with it.
We are growing sunflowers between the veg as part of an experimental solution to cleaning the soil. Rather than the usual stoop and plant , Dom designed an easy planting tool, a plastic hallow pipe with recycled yoghurt pot tied to the top and a stick tied to the bottom. Without stooping all you have to do is jab the stick into the ground to make a hole, take a couple of seed from the pot and drop them down the pipe Done! No back ache farming!

The guys and gals in the youth group are almost fully fledged farmers.

Totally Awesome !!