Smart farms

: 17 November 2017; Hits: 21262

JKUAT trains farmers on cricket farming

The Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology this week trained over 500 farmers on how to set up a cricket farm and the day to day management of the farm in a bid to build the capacity of the farmers on the importance of crickets as a food.

Cricket farming for value addition

Free farmers’ training set for 29th November in Kabete

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the global food crisis and malnutrition would be solved if poor families have access to inexpensive food items produced at the household level. The environment would also improve through reducing livestock farming and increasing farming of edible insects.

The training which was conducted from 13^th to 15^th November 2017 thus seeks to explore the opportunities of cricket farming in Kenya.

“We are spearheading the dissemination of cricket farming and I am confident that the training will produce competent cricket farmers who will eventually be trainers and champions of cricket farming in their various regions” said Prof. Mary Abukutsa, JKUAT Deputy Vice Chancellor in-charge of Research Production and Extension.

“Apart from being a center of excellence on cricket farming, we are also in the process of creating awareness of cricket farming to the food and feed manufacturers to provide a market for cricket products”

A handful of crickets

The university will provide technical support to farmers where needed so as to foster up scaling of cricket farming and utilization as a source of protein in food and feed.

Cricket farming could be a game changer in Kenya’s agricultural sector. Rearing of the crickets can be done easily as the insects use less land, feed and water.

They have a high nutritional value of over 60g/100g dry weight basis, this is higher than that of soybean (by 49 per cent dry weight basis) and beef (by 36 per cent dry weight basis), which are among the common conventional sources of proteins.

The farmers were provided with a handbook which describes some of the common cricket species used in farming and the daily management of a cricket farm including processing for sale and important risks to be taken into consideration.

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Tuesday, 17 November 2020 [quote=Seid Ali Yimam]I'm Seid A. from Hawassa University, Ethiopia. It is ver...

Wednesday, 11 November 2020 I'm Seid A. from Hawassa University, Ethiopia. It is very interesting. I have ...

Wednesday, 04 November 2020 [quote=Gathere]Interested. How do i get started and what's the market like?[/quo...

Tuesday, 03 November 2020 Interested. How do i get started and what's the market like?

: 14 November 2017; Hits: 12314

Potato seed multiplication earns farmer good cash

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Elisha Lang’at, a Bomet County farmer is earning Sh67, 500 every season from selling harvested potatoes as seeds to his counterparts at a time when the area is experiencing a shortage of potato seeds.

Bomet is a key potato growing county, the preferred source by processors however production is hampered by shortage of good quality seed potato. In 2015, USAID funded Kenya Agricultural Value.

Chains Enterprises Project working with Deepa Industries and approached Midlands Sacco in the county to interest its members to venture into seed multiplication in a bid to quench the thirst of shortage of quality potato seed.

Lang’at developed interest in multiplying potato seeds after attending the Midlands Sacco potato farming training. “We were taken through potato farming requirements and basic potato agronomical practices. This is why before farming potatoes for seeds I had to do soil testing as soil is the key requirement in raising potatoes,” said Lang’at.

From this training, he then took samples of soil from his one acre piece of land for a test and the results were positive, allowing him to grow potatoes.

“I bought three 50kg bags of starter seed at Sh3, 750 from the Agricultural Development Corporation in Bomet Town and planted. I harvested 10 bags from each seed bag, getting 30 bags of seed each 90kg and sold them earning about Sh25, 000 in total,” said Lang’at.

This encouraged him and decided to expand his farm to two acres so as to meet the growing demand. He has since decided to grow the potatoes for seed multiplication only. “I have no intention of growing potatoes for any other purposes but for seeds multiplication for the many farmers. I have increased my input in the two acres and I am currently harvesting 40 to 50 bags of 90kg each.”

A kilo of the seed variety sales at Sh25, this earns him an average of Sh90, 000 or more depending on the efforts he applies to grow and harvest more in a season.

Lang’at grows Asante and Challenger varieties of potatoes which do well in areas such as Timau, Tigoni,Molo, Narok, Bomet, Timboroa, and all other regions suitable for potato production which has an altitude of 2300m above the sea level, a condition good for the potatoes.

The two varieties take about 3-4 months to mature and can yield up to 40 tonnes per hectare. This makes his seeds more marketable.

Currently he is just waiting for the heavy rains in the region to reduce so that he can start harvesting. “This time round I am expecting over 80 bags from my small piece of land which I hope will increase my income,” said the 35 years old farmer.

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: 14 November 2017; Hits: 14194

Banana fibre turn the tide for an entrepreneur in Kirinyaga County

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Zola Madaga showcasing ICOSEED products during the Nairobi International Trade Fair, October 2017.

Integrated Community Organization for Sustainable Empowerment and Education for Development (ICOSEED) is turning banana pseudo stems into fibre that can be used to make fabrics for bags and table mats at a time when not many people in Kenya are aware of the fibre’s existence or use.

ICOSEED is an initiative founded by Patrick Gatere an agriprenuer from Kirinyaga County. It is based in Kutus where many banana farmers in the area after felling a mature banana tree to access the edible fruit, they usually feed the stem to their cattle or discard it to decay in the farm.

The enterprise therefore buys the stems from farmers, processes it into balls of fibre and drying it. Farmers are paid for the fibre extracted from their banana pseudo stems at Sh25 per Kilogram. The fibre is handed over to youth for brushing and finally to women for twining and dying. The coloured threads are passed on to hand loom operators who make fabric. The fabric is used to make bags, clutch purse, table mats and wall hangings.

In the recent past, banana fibre had a very limited application and was ordinarily used to make items like ropes, mats and other composite materials. However, banana fibre is not a recent innovation since people have been making fibre out of banana stems since the early 13th century in Japan. In Africa, Uganda and Rwanda are leading in the technology of banana fibre extraction and its value addition.

Impact

Economically the value chain has created income along the value chain by employing 100 people in transportation and extraction of fibers, twining and coloring, and accessory making hence reducing crime rate among the youth. In addition the initiative has strengthened the banana farmer groups with trainings in agronomy, increasing yields by 18% hence providing an alternative source of income for 400 farmers who benefit from the program every year.

The innovation has reduced carbon emissions by promoting the use of slurry for biogas digesters and manure, decreased the need for pesticides on farms by removing banana stem that serve as a breeding zone for diseases. ICOSEED contributes to the following Sustainable Development Goal (SDGs): decent work and economic growth, industry and innovation, and life on land.

The target market include exhibitions, word of mouth, online shopping, curio shops, tourist hotels, churches and super markets.

Netfund Effect

National Environment Trust Fund (NETFUND) has supported the initiative financially to the tune of KES 812,500 as well as technical and business support skills. This initiative has enabled ICOSEED purchase 3 more extractors and 4 more handlooms to increase production capacity and produce quality products. ICOSEED emerged as Switch Africa Green (SAG) SEED challenge Award winner 2017 courtesy of NETFUND and winner of Green Innovation Awards in the Civil Societies category in 2016.

Future Plans

ICOSEED plans to Increase the number of farmers supplying banana stems from 400 to 9,000 by 2018, Scale up the production capacity of banana fibre by buying new machinery, including additional mobile fibre extractors, diversify the product range to include sanitary towels within the next two years and establish two new production sites in key banana growing areas; Meru and Kisii, by 2022.

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