SEAD (Scottish Education and Action for Development)

Kenyan farmers are struggling against increasingly unpredictable seasons and weather conditions as a result of climate change. But through VETAID’s Farmer Field Schools these farmers are learning the skills like drought resistant farming that will be crucial in a climate change affected world.

Farming in Kenya is becoming ever more difficult. Because of climate change the seasons are becoming increasingly unpredictable, and weather conditions are becoming more extreme. More and more farmers are struggling to produce enough food from their land and are ultimately unable to feed themselves and their families.

80% of the population in rural areas of Kenya depend on small-scale agriculture. The increasing occurrence of droughts has meant that many people have been unable to produce sufficient crops to feed themselves and their families, and are often surviving on one meal a day.

In Machakos District, VETAID is training subsistence farmers in agricultural techniques which take into account the changing climatic conditions in the region. Local people are trained in using drought-resistant crops, cereal transplanting (a technique that improves yields in areas of low rainfall), ploughing methods which preserve soil moisture and nutrients, and community draught animal power schemes. These farming techniques also reduce dependency on fertilisers.

The training is done at Farmer Field Schools (FFS), where VETAID demonstrates the results that can be achieved by using these innovations. When local people see that the crops growing at the FFS are larger than those growing on their own land, they approach VETAID to find out how this has been achieved. They receive training in these farming techniques at the FFS, and can then pass on their new skills and knowledge to their families, neighbours and other members of the community.

The Selanga Vulnerable Self-help Group began three years ago and meets every Tuesday at their local Farmer Field School near Machakos town. The group is made up of 13 men and 37 women, including the very old and the very poor. In the past, all of the group members frequently faced almost complete crop failure.

Now, with the new skills and equipment they have through the FFS, they work together to increase the yield of their crops. The older group members offer advice, while the younger members help the older ones to farm their shambas. The group members also pass on the skills they have learnt to their households, further disseminating the knowledge learnt in the FFS.

They have a group bank account where they deposit any earnings from the crops they grow at the FFS. This money can either be reinvested in their agricultural activities or can be used to offer loans to group members so that they can start up small businesses.

Agnes Ndonga is a member of the Selanga Vulnerable Self-Help Group. She has nine adult children as well as two teenage grandchildren that she cares for, since their mother died. With such a large family, feeding them all from the crops grown on the family’s small plot of land is not easy. But with the higher yields she can achieve from the new farming methods, Agnes can now feed her family and can sell any surplus produce to bring in a small income.

You can see Agnes Ndonga in the photo, with the maize crop grown at the FFS that has grown to between knee and waist height. Crops grown near to the FFS, where the new techniques have not been used are only a few inches high. “When we plant in our homes as we learnt here,” she says, “we have a very good harvest.”

More about VETAID: www.vetaid.org

This entry was posted on 13 January 2009 at 11:01 pm and is filed under General news. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.