Up to 75 women farmers in Gilgil constituency have benefited from free water conservation and competitive food production techniques courtesy of Women Agricultural Scientists in a move aimed at making women drivers of sustainable food production in rural areas.
The women who struggle to practice subsistence farming in areas susceptible to soil erosion and erratic rains have acquired knowledge about soil conservation, viable crop cultivation practices on loose sandy soil and construction of water pans with a view of expanding their capacity to earn a living off their farms.
Soroptimist International (SI) is a peer empowerment group of 78,000 women across five continents that hopes the Kenyan beneficiaries with at least one acre each will be able to put Gilgil on track to the much elusive food sufficiency at the end of this planting season.
SI Kenya President Dorothy Mapenzi speaking in Nakuru on Sunday said the Sh33 million program seeks to reach out to 394 women in five other high agricultural but food insufficient areas of Kisumu, Kilifi, Kwale, and Machakos in a bid to accelerate food production while boosting low-income households often headed by women.
“The two-year program targets to benefit women farmers in organized groups in rural areas where members of the groups benefit from skills, certified farm inputs, and implements to enable them practice competitive models of crop farming as a way of scaling down poverty,” said Mapenzi.
Vegetable farmers, turned vendors, Wairimu Maina and Mary Wairimu are members of the Mwihoko women group, the first beneficiaries of the project that is also on course in Asia and Latin America.They intend to use the skills to cultivate food crops with a short maturity cycle for their families and the insatiable vegetable market in Gilgil and other urban areas in Nakuru.
They commend the program that has equipped them with a wealth of farming skills, farm implements, certified vegetable, maize and bean seeds, assorted fertilizer and plastic liners for their water pans on their farms.
They anticipate the water pans to help them harvest surface run-off in the region that receives irregular rains annually.
“The prospect for my eroded farm becoming a gainful enterprise is increasingly high and this will provide my children a steady livelihood,” said Wairimu.
Nakuru County Chief Agricultural Extension officer Dr. Morris Omondi observes that the program is invaluable in building climatic resilience among peasant farmers in the area that grapples with extensive soil erosion and deficient soil on farming land.
“The highly deficient soil in the region holds back food cultivation and only drives up poverty among households that are dependent on farming,” said Omondi.