An open Letter to Agricultural Students

Dear Agricultural students,

"Go to the University and get yourself a degree.Be grateful that you got a chance to be part of the team" . This is just one of the many statements you will encounter in your path to learning that agricultural course . 

Its these statements that will make you feel awful as to why you didn't get that Medicine position that you so hoped to and what you never thought of choosing during the JAB selection process turns out to be what you get. Now this is what happens. Agricultural sciences have been degraded in the past often being given the last option.During the JAB courses allocation, when all  other disciplines have their fill  the remaining un-allocated  students are lumped in to the Agricultural sciences as very few students pick them as their first choice.

Well you have no choice. You go with what is written in black and white. Three weeks after commencing your studies, your classmates  will do inter-faculty transfers with a majority of them blindly escaping to Faculty of Arts, BA to be specific. They cite reasons like Economics students have the say in campus when it comes to dressing and partying. Don't despair. You never came to school for dressing or partying reasons. You came to gain knowledge. You neighbors and some family members will also be on your neck disapproving your choice of  career, telling you how scanty jobs are in the agricultural arena.Listen to their concerns and be wise enough to settle on the best decision. And while at it, be bold enough to tell them that as farmers .............

For without food there's basically nothing the economist or the technology person can do. They all depend on farmers for daily sustenance. So imagine what happens when a new generation of farmers isn't raised to replace the old one? I bet you must have read that the average age of a farmer in Kenya is above 55 years of age constituting mostly of the old and retired. So what will happen when there's no one to continue the farming profession?We shall all starve and die, right? Or maybe manufacture our food in the laboratories.

In addition to showing that you aren't in the scam of professions, consider Prince Williams ,the Duke of Cambridge, who chose to enroll  himself  for an Agricultural Management course at Cambridge University so as to gain a deeper understanding of  issues affecting Agricultural businesses and rural communities in the UK. And it doesn't end there. We have  celebrities the likes of Nicole Kidman, Reese Witherspoon and Russell Crowe all preferring to get down in their farms. 

“I don't think any place of dirt anywhere in the world means more to me than this." 

Russell Crowe

So, Why am i saying this?

Its basically to show you that you are what you believe you are. And any career is as important as you deem it right in your mind. Passion is what it takes to be what you want to be and to be gracefully good while at it and job opportunities will follow you. And that is regardless of what people will tell you about the farming career. Let it come from within you.

Enough said so,........

Yours' farming
E.K

Linking Agriculture with Early Childhood Development:The case of Gandini Community

Photo: Development Horizons

Child malnutrition remains a big problem for children in Kwale County and despite the statistics on the same lacking, areas like Kinango, Samburu and Gandini seems worst hit. Poor nutrition affects both the physical and  intellectual development of the child concerned. By malnutrition in this case, i look at the lack of vital vitamin and mineral nutrients in a diet as opposed to the Protein-energy malnutrition. Read more on the difference here 

Having worked in the area for quite some time, i noted that consumption of greeny vegetables was not considered of paramount importance in the county. The most valued food stuff was maize. With a harvest of maize crop everyone is considered full and satisfied and its no shock to realize that the stew that goes with it is a mixture of table salt and water. Well in terms of quantity, these ECD going children are getting filled but quality wise, their bodies are just being fed regularly with only carbohydrates.

Its because of these reasons that i thought of introducing the aspect of sack gardening to the Gandini community. It happens to be one of the worst poverty hit areas. Notwithstanding is the fact that the area is adjacent to Moi International Airport. While taking off from the airport,its the area you mostly see with mud-walled makuti houses. I chose sack-gardening bearing in mind that the area gets quite dry and water scarcity isn't a once in a lifetime issue. And sack/container gardens happen to be the least consumers of water.With the help of Plan Kwale education program, i set out to train them on how to go about preparing the sacks and the containers to make them suitable for planting vegetables. The first crop selection was kales, Amaranthus and spinachs. To inculcate the gardening culture, we preferred to have the sacks placed near the nursery school.

The initial demonstration plot.
This we chose to be in the homestead of the chairperson of the Gandini village elders. A sample of kales and spinaches were prepared in the nursery bed and later transplanted  to help convert the theory into practice.

The preparations stage

My colleagues, the chairman  and i (Photographer) inspecting the sacks.

The sample demo plots
Notice the yellowed leaves where there was over-watering in this case.

The results
I left the organization i was working with then and i happen to be getting the progress of the project via twitter and phone calls.To my knowledge as of now, the project has spread to neighboring school and hopefully by mid next year, we will have substantive data to give a success story of how agriculture can be interlinked with Nutrition.

cc @emmiewakio your project is doing really well...wish you were still around pic.twitter.com/1ubKHw8Ygf
— Joy Nafungo (@maben12) August 22, 2013

The buck doesn't stop there. The aspect of consuming vegetables for their nutrient value is still minimal in the area. Hence the vegetables farming and consumption gospel has to be preached continuously as  having the vegetables and not consuming brings no difference in the lives the ECD children and their families.

PS:
Have a look at the average nutrient contents in various indigenous vegetables......

Mending the broken link: Agriculture and Health Nexus

For the Chicago Council Global Food Security Symposium 2013

One of the panelist: Dr. Howard-Yana Shapiro,

“Finally! Finally! Finally! ” Cries a woman. “Nutrition is now part of Food security discussions “ She continues. 

Later on we come to discover she is no other than Prof Ruth Oniang one of the panelist at the Agriculture and health nexus discussion panel at the Chicago Council Global Food security symposium 2013 and a founding CEO of Rural outreach Africa and African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition and Development; . Other panelists included:

Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, the co-director of the Program in Cardiovascular Epidemiology and associate professor of medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School; and associate professor of epidemiology at the Harvard School of Public Health. He also doubled as the moderator.

Dr. Subbanna Ayyappan, secretary, Department of Agricultural Research and Education, Government of India; director general, The Indian Council of Agricultural Research

Dr. Howard-Yana Shapiro, chief agricultural officer, Mars, Inc.; senior fellow, plant sciences, University of California, Davis; distinguished fellow, World Agroforestry Centre

How many times has the thought of nutrition crossed your mind while enjoying that sumptuous meal over dinner, lunch or breakfast? Have you ever thought of where you would get those vitamins you badly need if the smallholders farmers in the world went on a strike say for a day, or for a week? 

These are just some of the many questions that arose in the on the Agriculture and the Health nexus discussion whose aim was to provide new thinking on how current agricultural activities could interplay with health and nutrition objectives.

Earlier on, Rajiv shah, the USAID administrator in his address noted that to end hunger effectively, people need to work from farm to market to table. High nutrient levels are needed at all these stages the produce passes be it in production, processing and finally consumption. This brings to fore the interrelatedness of food security and nutrition security. There cannot exist one without the other.

Sharing her experiences working amongst rural women in Kenya, Prof Ruth noted that if we have to build a solid foundation on nutrition security, then we need to empower women as they are the majority of smallholder farmers and hence determine what is consumed. Being decision makers ,its becomes important for them to know that having or growing  food is not enough rather focus should be on growing and consumption of  nutrient rich food. She pointed out critical issues ailing nutrition security the likes of gender mainstreaming, lack of funding, food insecurity at the household level and a case of aging agricultural scientists with no young people to replaced. She feared for Africa’s case being like Guatemala‘s where for every one hundred agricultural scientists they had, only eight are left. Tackling these setbacks could possibly set Africa as the global food basket in the near future.

“Africa might be looking like this abandoned child but she might feed the whole world in the near future” she optimistically stated

Dr. Mozaffarian emphasized that as we align ourselves in the nutritional security thinking, we need to keep in mind the core goals of nutrition, which are reducing malnutrition and under nutrition. Across the globe, approximately 2 billion people lack access to nutrients needed for their bodies to healthy. Every five minutes a child dies from hunger related diseases.

“We need to have a global view of health from utero to the elderly” emphasized Dr. Mozaffarian

On the other hand, Dr Shapiro stressed on the importance of knowledge sharing. He called out to private organizations to make nutrition segments of plant genes public so crops can be improved through research leading to better and nutrient full varieties.

“It was right to go after agricultural productivity early on, but now have to shift from calories to nutrient-dense foods” he insisted.

Dr Ayyappan shared his insights on dietary changes and the resultant ailments in India. He shared his views of encouraging gardening in both schools and at homes as a way of promoting food security and hence subsequently improving nutrition. 

Summing up the discussion, Dr Shapiro acknowledged his shock at the optimism expressed at the symposium and stated that feeding the world is indeed a huge challenge.

Do you think so?

  PS: Short summary of tweets for The Agriculture and the Health Nexus Discussion

Does Agricultural Research Deliver?

Flash back to 2007 

Am seated in an agronomy class in my first year stay in campus and the lecturer in front is talking about  extension officers and their link to helping improve agriculture which happens to be the backbone of our economy..My mind clouds with thoughts and I hear the lecturer saying tidbits about …training…advise..

Extension officers?  Wait a minute! Agricultural extension officers? Who are they? What do they do?  Whom are they supposed to help/advise/train?

Prior to joining Egerton University to study a Bachelor of agribusiness management, I had never come across agricultural extension officers, where I grew up, in Nanyuki, Kenya! Never mind its vast grassland area which supports a range of livestock. Basic knowledge on the importance of deworming animals was lacking causing farmers to give the animals a homemade concoction of boiled Aloe Vera and boiled tree twigs. The result? Deterioration of animals health and subsequent death.

This led me to volunteer during holidays as an extension officer with the Ministry of Agriculture and Ministry of livestock Development in the Coast province to learn bits about extension advice. With participation in extension officers’ field days, I learnt a lot and took part in information dissemination to farmers in the coastal areas specifically on the Nerica rice variety which does well in arid areas and improved bee keeping methods. Later on I replicated my knowledge and still I am, to farmers in Nanyuki with the help of the administration authorities.

Flash forward to 2012
I am seated on my desk watching the video of Joseph Kaguatha narrate his farming ordeals in Lari District of Kenya. And I fully understand what he says. Just like other rural farmers, he faces the common challenges in his subsistence farming trade:

• Dependence on rain fed agriculture
• Land subdivision and fragmentation resulting to lower land productivity hence food insecurity at the household level.
• Lack of extension advice from the agricultural extension officers placed at district levels.
• Lack of new technologies in farming e.g.  Water harvesting or alternatives water sources for agricultural purposes.
• Agricultural researches not reaching the intended beneficiary hence no impact felt at ground i.e. the rural farmers

All is not lost and Joseph believes these challenges could be solved if partnership is maintained between the research institutions, government extension officers and the farmers.
The second Global Conference on Agricultural Research and development (GCARD2) happening in Uruguay seeks to address among others the theme of Partnership and its relation to agricultural research for Development. Do join the proceedings form 29^th October to 1^st November online, and highlight any issue you feel is affecting you or other farmers in any Agricultural related field.

This blogpost  was written for GCARD Blog  by Emmie Kio( Me), one of  the GCARD2 social reporters.

Find the original post here:   http://gcardblog.wordpress.com/2012/10/21/does-agricultural-research-deliver/

Breaking off the poverty chains: Urban farming in Nairobi, Kenya

Quite a number of us have practiced backyard farming: Rabbit keeping, vegetable/kitchen farming, poultry keeping and so forth in rural areas. These we keep as pets or even as a source of ready vegetables and meat for our daily consumption.

The rapid increase in urbanization and subsequent rise in urban food insecurity has resulted to the mushrooming of this kind of agriculture in urban centers with scholars naming it Urban Agriculture .In essence it translates to keeping animals and growing crops in the cities. It’s either conducted in the cities (intra urban) through ways like sack gardening or outside the cities confines (Peri urban) in green houses, on off-farm plots or on large acreage farmers.

A boost to this form of farming has come by from the support several national and international organizations who have showcased the venture as a good means for solving the problem of food insecurity in urban centers of developing world. This in turn has led to Kenyan agricultural researchers incorporating it as an important aspect in the Kenyan land policy.

So how important is urban farming?

According to Resources for Urban Agriculture Foundation (RUAF) come 2020, 75% of most of the populations in Africa, Asia and Latin America will be concentrated in the urban centers. A majority of these cities economies are at their developing stage which will then translate to rising of issues like unemployment, inadequate nutrition, food insecurity and buildup of wastes in urban centers soaring up. Urban farming comes in to help mitigate some of these issues through its various actors the likes of the urban poor, the women, the researchers and mid -level government officials.
Urban farming shows a lot of potential in:

•  Ensuring food security and provision of necessary nutrition. Less transport costs to the markets are incurred which in turn offers a fair produce price to the poorest of the poor in the urban areas.
•  Boosting the economic status of a family. Less money is spent in purchase of vegetables and there is notable barter exchange with other commodities.
•  Social impacts to disadvantaged and marginalized members of the society. Women groups, orphans and immigrants by giving them decent livelihoods in urban areas.
•  Researchers disseminating agricultural research to farmers as they are able to interact freely with them know their farming needs and develop new technologies  based on the specific needs identified.
• Greening the cities. Treated waste water from sewers is used to irrigate farms while  waste vegetable matter  in municipal dump sites are used to provide organic compost in farms hence reducing pollution to these urban centers.

Research should be “bottom heavy”
In the video at the top of the post, Mary Njenga, an agricultural researcher in Nairobi, not only talks about her passion for urban farming and why she is glad of its incorporation in the land policy of Kenya. She also calls for a shift in the attitude and approach of researchers. “People are tired of researchers coming to take soil samples or crop samples, or yet another questionnaire”, she says. “Research should be bottom heavy. Innovation that researchers build, should come from the farmers.”


This blogpost  was written  for the GCARD Blog  by Emmie Kio, one of  the GCARD2 social 
 reporters.

Link to the original post :  http://gcardblog.wordpress.com/2012/10/20/breaking-off-poverty-chains-case-urban-farming-nairobi-kenya/#more-1663

The Road from GCARD1 to GCARD2, and Beyond........

The three main themes of The Second Global Conference on Agricultural Research for Development (GCARD2)  are:

• Foresight for Impact- Matching research priorities to future development needs
• Partnerships for impact
• Capacity development for impact

The key elements emanate from the GCARD1 Roadmap which paved way for relevant and more responsive agricultural research for all development systems in the world. GCARD2 builds its foundation on it, looking at where we stand currently, how the changes they predicted/promised are happening and what impacts can be shown.

So what are these elements, their corresponding outcomes and their links to the conference themes?

Theme “F”: Foresight for Impact:
GCARD2 offers a chance for all stake holders to think beyond the conference to see ways in which the future agricultural challenges present themselves and the needs of smallholder farmers can help in shaping the process of agricultural innovation.

Expected Outcome I: Through a Global Foresight Hub, collective actions will be agreed upon with the major purpose of bringing together all analyses and reviews of future Agricultural Research For Development (AR4D) needs from all international, regional and national stakeholders. This will form part in creating better policies and in so priorities for research oriented organizations.

Theme “P”: Partnerships:
As the old adage goes; No man is an island. In the same way, no organization, no matter how good it is, survives in a vacuum. The same applies to GCARD2 as it looks for partnerships along its areas of research and development that will help reaching the aim of improving the lives of millions of people in the world.

Expected Outcome II: there is a great likelihood of success on the side of impacts for smallholders. This is for the mere fact that there will be agreements on common purposes and mutual commitments to the objectives of CGIAR Research Programs (CRPs) and other global partnerships programs.

Theme “C”: Capacity Development:
Institutional Learning and empowerment of Youths
Looking closer we see few youths interested in agricultural related careers with particular interest women. What new skills and capabilities do you feel are lacking? How can we attract and retain young people in these agricultural careers? GCARD2 will focus on determining investment needs in various levels of agricultural research and development for different generation groups.

Expected Outcome III:  A spring up of major new initiatives globally, launched to address capacity needs in the areas of investment and careers. This in turn will lead to increased investments, creation of more attractive agricultural careers and key barriers to the impact of agricultural research and innovation addressed.

Empowerment of Women
According to Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) in The State of Food and Agriculture , women play a vital role in advancing agricultural development and food security. They are efficient agricultural producers and can achieve higher yields given the same resources their counterpart men are given. And agricultural research definitely needs more of them as African Women in Agricultural Research and Development demonstrates in their working. GCARD looks in to the specific needs of women producers and puts them central in the process of agricultural research and rural development.

Expected Outcome IV: Creation of Collective actions committed to reshape AR4D systems to better reflect women’s perspectives and enable their direct access to innovation products and services.

Reporting Framework:
The GCARD2 offers a chance for all stakeholders, sectors and regions to report on their activities and the progress they have achieved in the delivery of GCARD Roadmap. This will help in creating check points of where they stand at present, what went well and what could have been done in a much better way.

Expected Outcome V: There will be a demonstration of renewed commitments to transforming and strengthening AR4D systems at international, regional and national levels. This will form the basis for GCARD3 in 2014.

This blogpost was written by Emmie Kio and uploaded by Robert Kibaya, two of the GCARD Social Reporters for the GCARD2 Conference .Original post can be found at  http://gcardblog.wordpress.com/2012/10/12/road-from-gcard1-to-gcard2/


Picture courtesy Peter Casier/CCAFS