People in Action: Stories from the Field
Stories from the field demonstrate the wide variety of people, issues and organizations working together to improve agriculture for Africa’s small-scale farmers.
Farmers Speak Out on Soil Health »
AGRA Rekindles Hope for Zanzibar’s Cassava Farmers »
Kofi Annan Meets with Farmers and Farm Businesses Western Kenya »
Farmers Speak Out on Soil Health
GAUDENCIA NYONGESA - Farmer - Busia District, Kenya
Gaudencia Nyongesa was born in 1960 and attended school through grade level 3. She married her husband, Joseph Okoth, in 1983. The couple lives on one acre, and has a household of four people. They grow maize, sorghum, millet and groundnut, and keep cows, goats and chickens. Typical yields for the household are ½ sack of maize per season, priced at Ksh 40/gorogoro. Gaudencia engages in small business sales and labor to supplement her farm income.
My name is Gaudencia Nyongesa. I started farming here a long time ago. That was when I got married. My problem is, I plant and weed well but still get nothing out of it. I get things like this groundnut. Now I don’t know what to do.
When I started farming the harvests used to be very bad. It’s only when I started applying manure that it improved to this. I never used to get even one kilogram of maize. But now it has improved a bit. I get about three kilograms. My neighbours have the same problem. We don’t know what to do.
Now we are forced to leave our farms and look for manual labour elsewhere so as to get money to buy food from the market to feed our children. For example, 1 kg of maize costs 30 shillings in the market, and 1 kg of sorghum is 35 shillings, and we earn 50 shillings a day from manual labour. That money is not even enough for two meals a day. It can only buy lunch, especially if you have a family. So my heart is always troubled, because I keep worrying about what the children will eat. Or else I go to the market and sell small items to get money to buy food for them.
At least nowadays there is free primary education. But still we have to buy school uniforms. So you find a lot of kids going without them because there is no money to buy the school uniforms. If you get some little money, you can only buy one at a time. And the others are also waiting to buy not only uniforms but food.
If you can find other ways to help, let us know, because we are really struggling to farm but we are not getting anything. And we have kids we need to feed, and also buy uniforms for them.
We’ve tried all ways. It’s been difficult.
KEPHA ADERA WIRE - Farmer - Busia District, Kenya
Kepha Adera Wire was born in 1946. He received his diploma in Theology from the Limuru College of Theology. He is married to Mary Anyango Baraza and Catherine Mugari, and their combined household consists of eight people. They live on two acres in Busia District. Kepha grows bananas, soybeans, maize, millet, sorghum and sweet potatoes, and keeps cows and chickens. His farm typically yields two sacks of maize per year priced at Ksh 40/gorogoro. His wife works as a tailor to supplement their income.
My name is Kepha Adera Wire. I started farming in the year 1990. That was after I retired from employment. At that time crops used to do well. We used to get good harvests from maize, millet and sorghum. But as time went by, all that completely changed for the worse. When I began, I used to get 8 to 10 90-kg bags of maize per acre. Nowadays we get only one bag per acre if we are lucky.
I think the soil fertility has gone down due to over-utilization of land. We have small plots of land, so we never let it lie fallow. This growing of the same crops each season has led to depletion of the soils. Another problem is soil erosion. When I began, soil erosion was not as bad as it is today. I think it’s because there were many trees and terracing was practiced. Furthermore, the population was low. Now that the population has grown, people cut trees for many uses, like constructing houses. Another problem we have is the increase of destructive ants. There are many species of ants which are very hard to control. I think the poor soils have also brought about the striga weed, which is a big problem to us. What the striga weed does is to suffocate the crops, especially maize, millet and sorghum, such that when it attacks a maize farm, this is the kind of crop we get.
Personally, what I do first to improve poor soils is to apply composite manure. Secondly I practice crop rotation, for example crops like beans, groundnuts and soya beans. These crops have helped replenish nutrients in my small farm. In my farm I also prevent soil erosion in two ways. One is to plant Nappier grass. Second, I dig terraces, as you can see, and that has really helped me replenish the fertility in my land. To control the striga weed I uproot it and bury it in one big hole. Then there are other crop varieties that the striga weed doesn’t affect much; crops like sweet potatoes. And there is also a variety of maize that is resistant to the weed; that’s the one we are trying to grow.
Back to topAGRA Rekindles Hope for Zanzibar’s Cassava Farmers
For Mama Juma and her family who live in Zanzibar Island, Tanzania, cassava has provided different sources of dishes for breakfast, lunch and dinner since time immemorial. Getting that food on the table has often been a struggle. Now, however, things are finally getting easier.
- Cassava Eats and Treats
- Cassava Benefits to Farmers
- Challenged by Disease
- Conquering Disease
- Breeding the Ultimate Cassava
- Achieving Economic Success
- From Small Scale Farmers to Entrepeneurs
Cakes and porridge are made from cassava flour.
In the morning, the family enjoys porridge made from cassava flour while at lunch time deep-fried cassava chips constitute a good snack for the whole family. At dinner time, cassava ‘ugali’, which is a thick smooth mash, made of finely ground cassava flour thoroughly cooked and shaped into a round cake, is then eaten as an accompaniment for the many fish dishes which are readily available and affordable in the Island. The cassava pilau is also a delicacy for dinner or lunch and is prepared by boiling fresh roots in coconut milk or vegetable/animal oil.
For this family and many others like it, who are largely small-scale rural farmers, cassava has not only been a major source of food security, but a source of income too. Its importance as a food crop in Zanzibar comes second only to that of rice.
Apart from the fresh roots, dried chips and flour which are the major uses of cassava in Zanzibar, it is also grown for its leaves which are normally used as vegetable for human and sometimes as feeds for livestock while the stems sometimes are used for fire woods.
For Mama Juma and other low-income, small-scale farmers, cassava is also less hassling as a crop, because it is easy to grow and is adaptable to various broad ranges of agro-ecological conditions and diverse soils where other crops do not do very well. Better still, Mama Juma has not had to budget for fertilizer from her meagre income of less than $1 a day--the cassava crop has grown easily without fertilizer.
Cassava leaves infected with CBSD.
Zanzibar breeder Haji Saleh displays a diseased cassava.
Although cassava is one of the most important food crops in Zanzibar, yields have been generally low due to its susceptibility to diseases. Indeed, Mama Juma’s livelihood and that of many Zanzibar cassava small-scale farmers was threatened by widespread hunger when Cassava Brown Streak Disease (CBSD) attacked this island. Losses from this disease were estimated to be as high as 100% when CBSD struck the farms. This led to Zanzibar being referred to as the home of Cassava Brown Streak Disease. It led to despair and uprooting of the crop by farmers.
A healthy cassava plant.
This situation has however changed. Breeders at Kizimbani Research Station in Zanzibar began to reverse the spread of the Cassava Brown Streak Disease when, in 2006, four new varieties (KBH482, KBH494, KBH517, and KBH477) that are tolerant to CBSD and to drought were released to farmers.
Mama Juma, and her business partners at the Mitakawani Cassava Processing Site, a cottage industry that adds value to the cassava roots, celebrated the release of the new cassava breeds. The new varieties would now supply their small enterprise with good processing cassava qualities and better-tasting cassava flour for their customers.
Cassava breeders from across Sub-Saharan Africa meet in Zanzibar, October 2007.
Asked how breeders in Zanzibar achieved the breeding of a tasty cassava, Mr. Haji Saleh, a breeder from Kizimbani Research Station, says it was not always easy to get farmers to accept the planting materials: “We breeders were losing millions of shillings because farmers rejected the cassava breeds the scientists struggled to develop.”
The breeders’ breakthrough came when they developed a farmer participatory strategy to incorporate farmers’ views from research inception. They started inviting farmers for Preliminary Yield Trials (PYT), Advanced Yield Trials (AYT) and Uniform Yield Trials (UYT) in farmer fields. Ownership of the new breeds from the cassava was amazing; the farmers themselves selected their preferred breeds for taste, drought resistance and dry matter.
The full economic benefit of cassava, however, can only be felt if this crop, normally regarded to as an “orphan crop,” goes into commercial production with sufficient sustained volume. Through support from the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), Zanzibar breeders have developed strategies to increase availability and use of healthy planting materials that will contain the spread of diseases.
AGRA’s mission is to revitalise small-scale farming across Africa and thus end widespread hunger and poverty for farmers and their families. Therefore, it makes sense for AGRA to support the development of cassava varieties for small-scale farmers. AGRA has given a grant to the Root and Tuber Improvement Program at Kizimbani Research Station to breed disease- and pest-resistance and early root yield genes into cassava varieties that Zanzibar farmers already prefer. The project will also link surplus harvests to new market opportunities for farmers.
The project is therefore building the entrepreneurial capacity of farmers to do cassava farming ‘as a business.’ Mr. Haji says that although private-sector involvement in cassava is still in its infant stage in Zanzibar, the project is taking advantage of the starch needed by the textile industry, and has been linking cassava farmers to textile industries for supply of starch. Now, Haji says, demand for the starch surpasses the supply due to linkages they have set up between farmers and processors. The farmers are anxious to get planting material of the new varieties.
Haji says, “I cannot contain the zeal of farmers to get planting material of the improved varieties. They come and pinch my experiments just to get the cuttings for planting.”
To meet this demand, the Zanzibar breeders are improving knowledge of cassava multiplication techniques amongst the farmers.
From Small-Scale Farmers to Entrepreneurs
Farmers formed a cassava flour processing plant to increase the value of their crop.
Cottage industries, such as the one Mama Juma belongs to, provide another avenue to improve income for the resource-poor farmers. In the past, Mama Juma used to sell raw cassava tubers in the market for approximately $3 for an 80 kg bag. With support from International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, (IITA) and other partners, Mama Juma and a group of people in the village formed the Mitakawani Cassava Processing Site to increase the value of the cassava root by milling cassava flour. Now, their concerted efforts earn $6 for an 80 kg bag of cassava, doubling their income. To satisfy customers, the group needed good tasting varieties and thanks to the AGRA-supported Zanzibar breeders’ efforts, the yields are higher and have good processing qualities, meaning the community group is milling better tasting flour and increasing its income.
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Kofi Annan Meets with Farmers and Farm Businesses Western Kenya
On 15 July 2007, Kofi Annan, Chairman of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), travelled through rural western Kenya on a fact-finding mission. He met with farmers, plant breeders, agro-dealers and others whose efforts are launching a green revolution for Africa’s small-scale farmers.
Hundreds of farmers and other onlookers lined the route to hear Mr. Annan speak about ways to increase farmer yield and incomes, and to communicate their own concerns. To bolster a revolution in farming that will overcome poverty, Annan will travel throughout Africa, meeting and sharing ideas with farmers, entrepreneurs, scientists, and political leaders.
- Farm Experiments Yield Results
- Seed Company Sprouts
- Rural Farm Stores Come to Kenya
- Village Stock Markets for Farm Produce
Farm Experiments Yield Results
Kofi Annan and plant breeder Jane Ininda.
Standing beneath the rustling leaves of the maize plants, AGRA plant breeder Dr. Jane Ininda went through the basics of breeding, explaining with a smile that maize is different from human beings because the male and female elements are contained in the same plant. She said two new varieties being tested here were intended to produce higher yields and provide greater resistance to disease and pests such as the corn borer.
On the edge of the trial plot, three Kenyan PhD candidates in plant breeding – Clement Kamau Karari, Joseph Kamau and Crispus Oduori – stood next to photo boards explaining their work in sorghum, cassava and finger millet, three important African food security crops that have often been overlooked in plant-breeding research. Oduori, who is believed to be the only finger millet breeder in Africa, said if work isn’t done to improve these crops, “they will be left behind.”
“We are here in partnership to increase productivity, and we are working with these African scientists to make a difference,” Annan told the gathering. “Not everyone has to work in the city. Agriculture is a noble profession, and I’m very proud of you for staying here.”
Kofi Annan and Saleem Esmail.
The Western Seed Company (WSC) is one of perhaps 25 small- and medium-sized seed companies in Eastern and Southern Africa that aim to get improved varieties of local crops into the hands of small-scale farmers. These start-up companies could fill a gap for farmers who lack varieties that are high-yielding and hardy, but the companies face big obstacles.
Esmail described his own difficulties accessing financing from commercial banks—until he obtained a $1 million loan from the venture capital fund African Agricultural Capital. The loan will allow WSC to expand its operations and serve larger numbers of small-scale farmers.
“Human beings must have the freedom to be innovative, to be creative, in order to change the world,” Esmail told Annan. He said that one challenge to African agriculture “is the cost of money. Banks here charge 17, 18 percent interest….the commercial banks here want your shirt, your tie, your wardrobe.”
The Western Seed CEO said that farmers using the company’s new maize varieties have increased their yields per hectare from one ton to four; and that the company was reducing the price of its WS505 maize variety by 20 per cent, making it more affordable to small-scale farmers. The price of a 2-kilo package of seed (enough for 0.1 hectares) would now be 240 shillings (US$3.63).
Rural Farm Stores Come to Kenya
Mr. and Mrs. Annan and Mr. Wambua.
The white letters on the green store front read WAYSIDE AGROVET. Behind the wooden counter in crisp white lab coats stood Godfrey Wambua, his wife Martha and his mother Rebecca. “This is a family business,” said the 34-year-old agro-dealer as he welcomed Annan and his wife into the crowded shop filled with sacks of seed and fertilizer.
Wambua explained that after leaving college, he had wanted to open a shop but lacked the means. Then he learned about the Agricultural Market Development Trust (AGMARK), the Kenyan affiliate of the US-based Citizens Network for Foreign Affairs, a non-partisan international development organisation that helps locally owned grassroots agribusinesses supply farm inputs and increase farmers’ access to new markets. Through AGMARK, Wambua gained access to credit that helped him establish his small business. He also purchased a bicycle so that he could make the rounds to his customers.
Wambua is one of 597 agro-dealers who have received training and credit through AGMARK. In some places, the new businesses have reduced the distance farmers must travel to get farm inputs from 15 kilometres to 3.
The AGRA-supported AGMARK is set to expand to 30 districts in Kenya. Such growth is needed. It is estimated that 90 per cent of poor farmers in western Kenya do not use improved seeds or fertilizer.
Wambua said his best selling items are maize and garden vegetable seeds and fertilizer He also sells veterinary products since “animal health is very critical because in every home you don’t miss an animal.” “The challenges are there,” he said. “Sometimes you may not be able to satisfy everybody, but you try your best, isn’t it? You put the customer first.”
Village Stock Markets for Farm Produce
Mr. Mukhebi explains the Market Information Point trading board.
Soko Hewani, the on-air commodities market program on West FM radio, had already spread the word to listeners in the Webuye and Bungoma area of western Kenya that former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan would be visiting, telling them that now he was wearing a farmer’s hat. A large crowd had gathered when the new AGRA chairman arrived at the Chiwele Market Resource Centre, one of the rural market information points (MIP) franchised by the Kenya Agricultural Commodity Exchange (KACE).
Prior to the establishment of these MIPs, farmers seldom knew ahead of time about the going prices for their products. Now, they can come to the centre and check the blackboard to compare prices in half a dozen area markets for maize seed, dry maize, onions, cabbages, beans, cooking bananas, local chickens, dairy cows and bulls.
KACE chairman Adrian Mukhebi told Annan this information, furnished through the Regional Commodity Trade and Information System, had enabled farmers to improve the prices they are getting by as much as 20 percent compared with those farmers who don’t use the service. Price information is also broadcast on West FM and is available through a text messaging service from Safaricom, one of three local cell phone companies. The MIPs also serve as small trading floors for local commodities, while KACE’s trading floor at its Nairobi headquarters serves as a national commodity clearinghouse.
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