Commercializing agriculture kills small-scale farming, Kenyan local farmers worry.
“Small-scale operations account for over 70 percent of agricultural production and meet about 75 percent of the national food demand. Therefore, the most important reason for supporting small-scale farming is its critical role in achieving food security, particularly for those who are vulnerable to chronic hunger or food poverty.”
Meet a teacher in the eastern part of Kenya who puts food on most Kenyans plates. Stella Muthama is a teacher of Agriculture and Social Studies at Mbembani primary school, Ikombe zone, Machakos County.
Her day starts by walking to school where she teaches pupils, but after a long day she goes back to her home where she spends the evening hours, weekends and holidays farming.
Her interest in agriculture increased in 2016 when she attended an agricultural show during which time, she interacted with an organization that invited her for a training in Nairobi. Stella didn’t go alone. She mobilized her nine friends towards the same course.
They later formed a group known as Machakos Farmers Network, where they practice ecological farming. A system where farmers are protected from over resilience on agro chemicals by adopting indigenous soil protection measures such as manure instead of fertilizers, indigenous seeds and use of biological mechanisms to control pests.
Experts encourage this kind of farming because it eliminates challenges of harmful agro chemicals to the environment which poison soils, water and even animals and plants.
Stella Muthama, the group leader says the sixty members plant maize, beans, mangoes, cabbage and onions for sale and home consumption.
“We attended an Agricultural show in Machakos, asked questions on how they preserve indigenous seeds and prepare pesticides,” says Mrs. Muthama.
The 45 years old attributes the success of this network to the support she gets from her husband. They both go to the farm and decide when to plant and sell their farm produce together.
“Like maize we sell at the beginning or end of harvesting season when prices are favourable. Fruits and vegetables have more profits compared to maize. For example, I can make Kenya shillings 30,000 from cabbage sales. If I sell maize planted in the same size of land, I get very little money.” Said the mother of four. Like many small-scale farmers, Stella and her family depend on their farms for their livelihood, school fees and offsetting medical bills.
“My work helps me a lot because I supplement with kitchen farming. So, I have food free from chemicals, be it flesh. I don’t go to buy. I only slaughter and eat white meat which has no (negative) health effects. I also have eggs at home. So, we eat balanced diet without spending a coin,” Mrs. Muthama told The Insider.
While other small-scale farmers struggle to get money for farm inputs, this is not the case for Machakos Farmers Network. Here they depend on poultry and livestock to get manure. Mrs. Muthama says they also make their own pesticides from plants like Aloe Vera and Neem tree.
“We make pesticides from indigenous trees. There are leaves which we mix with pepper then add garlic. The mixture is sprayed on our farms to prevent and kill pests. We also use organic manure from chicken, goats, and sheep,” she says.
Last year, Kenya through the Ministry of Agriculture came up with a plan to commercialise small-scale farming in the country. The plan dubbed Agricultural Sector Transformation and Growth Strategy (2019-2029) is a reaction to World Bank’s rebuke of the government’s handling of the sector.
This policy targets one million farmers, pastoralists and fishermen who will be supported by government infrastructure such as irrigation. It is not yet known the formulae government will use to get the number, but even before that, Organizations like Greenpeace Africa, that have been in the forefront campaigning for ecological farming are against this policy.
While marking World Food Day this year, through its campaigner Claire Nasike, the organisation termed government’s policy as “cutting the hand that feeds it.”
“Commercializing Kenya’s agricultural systems will not only reduce the resilience of local communities to produce more food but also increase the contamination of our natural resources by chemical fertilisers and pesticides,” said Nasike in a press statement released on August 3rd, 2020.
Nasike calls on the government to tap into local resilience of small-scale farmers and improve the country’s food system which has become more vulnerable during this COVID-19 pandemic.
According to the Root to Food report released in 2016, small-scale farmers dominate agriculture in Kenya and is practised on average farms between 0.2 – 3 hectares, feeding seven out of every ten Kenyans.
“Small-scale operations account for over 70 percent of agricultural production and meet about 75 percent of the national food demand. Therefore, the most important reason for supporting small-scale farming is its critical role in achieving food security, particularly for those who are vulnerable to chronic hunger or food poverty,” reads part of the Root to Food data available here.
Farmers like Stella Muthama look forward to producing more food that will continue feeding Kenyans who already depend on them. They hope government will support them so that their network can spread to other parts of the country.
“In future, we would love to continue because we have helped farmers transform by having our own wells and water tanks for irrigating farms. Each homestead also has food in their farms. We no longer buy from markets instead we sell.”said Mrs. Muthama.
However, they fear that commercialising agriculture is likely to influence their kind of crops and pesticides denying them the freedom to make decision.
“If the government can create for us market with good prices, then we have no problem. We will only accept indigenous seeds. We want to continue planting crops we are used to. Our members are used to selling part of our produce and still keep some for domestic use,” Mrs. Muthama says.
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