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Malawian small scale farmers improve skills with help from researchers in Canada and Malawi.

Posted on May 4th, 2011

Maria Mayuni, participating farmer, standing with her husband in their field of groundnuts and pigeonpea- February 2011.

In northern Malawi, farmers have been getting help identifying the best legume options. It’s part of an ongoing effort by reasearchers from Canada and Malawi, that helps improve soil fertility, food security and family nutrition. More than four thousand farmers in the region are part of the Soils, Food and Healthy Communities program (SFHC).

“So far we have focused on legume intercrop methods like soya, pigeon-pea and ground nut to improve the quality of the soil and provide different edible crops for households at different times of the year,” said Dr. Rachel Bezner-Kerr, the Canadian researcher who has been coordinating the SFHC program.

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Dr.  Bezner-Kerr, is an assistant professor in the department of geography at University of Western Ontario. She is one of the people who initiated the program with researchers at Ekwendeni Hospital in northern Malawi.

“I think I’ve always been struck by how unjust it is that there are people in this world who do not have enough food while we have vast amounts of food in our world,” said Dr. Bezner-Kerr. “And I’m also really concerned about the unsustainable way we do farming in general in the world.”

One of the improved farming methods involves burying the residue of the legume crops after the harvest. This gives farmers the option to plant maize the following year in enriched soil without using fertilizer.

Dr. Rachel Bezner-Kerr and her daughter Miriam in Ekwendeni, Malawi.

Dr. Bezner-Kerr said she connected with the project in Ekwendeni after meeting a nurse who was committed to making a difference in the community. Sustainable farming has a major impact on food security and healthy lives.

While Dr. Bezner-Kerr is responsible for coordinating the research, she credits Malawian farmers and the SFHC staff for the success of the project. People, with limited resources, volunteered their time, distributing seeds, holding workshops on how to diversify the diet with different legumes from the project, and keep a close watch so that accurate data can be collected.

For over fifteen years now, Dr. Bezner-Kerr has spent several months a year in Malawi working on different organic strategies to improve soil fertility.

Aside from the increased yield, Dr. Bezner-Kerr said part of the evaluation of the SFHC has included monitoring farmers who have been feeding their families the legume based diets.

“We’ve found evidence of increased child growth from farmers using this method.”

While there are successes, Dr. Bezner-Kerr said there are also obstacles to be confronted. The Malawian government’s fertilizer subsidy program is one of these. Fertilizer is expensive in Malawi and poor farmers can buy it at about half the price with government subsidies she explained.

Participating farmers - husband and wife Oscar Nguru and Witness Zgamo standing beside maize grown after cowpea residue has been incorporated into the soil to improve soil fertility. February 2011.

“The government has placed a lot of emphasis on fertilizer and that has led at times to the farmers feeling that there’s no point in working on improving the soil using legume intercrop, if they can also get free fertilizer,” said Dr. Bezner-Kerr. “But when the subsidy stops, they’re back to square one in terms of trying to address their own food security.”

Dr. Bezner-Kerr said SFHC has to work hard to educate farmers on the long term benefits of improving soil fertility, without fertilizer.

Paul Mkandawire is a Malawian graduate student of health geography at the University of Western Ontario, and he has been working with Dr. Bezner-Kerr. He is investing his time researching solutions to his country’s food crisis.

While Mkandawire’s area of study focuses on the health and livelihood of HIV/Aids orphans in Malawi, he believe the country’s food security improves lives in other ways. Already he has noted changes.

Paul Mkandawire with Dr. Bezner-Kerr at a conference in Kenya.

“I think there has been increased adoption of farming strategies promoted by SFHC and this will improve the quantity of harvested crops, improve soil fertility and also preserve the environment,” said Mkandawire.

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He said he hopes farmers will grow more legume based crops and less maize, which has been commercialised. He said legume intercrops will also help reduce damage to the environment.

“I think the big deal is that people should become less dependent on maize so that they depend on other sources of carbohydrates like sweet potatoes, millet and other legume crops which are less dependent on fertilizers,” said Mkandawire. “Then that is not only good for them in terms of cost saving but that is also good for climate change because they will release less fossil fuels into the environment.”

Mkandawire said as long as the participating farmers return slowly to indigenous legumes there will be progress.

Man and woman grinding soya flour during a recipe day, August 2009.

Dr. Bezner-Kerr said she will be monitoring the developments but admits there are other obstacles such as gender inequality.

“For example you might have a household increase their legume production and their soils but if the husband decides to sell the groundnuts and use that money for beer, it may not improve family nutrition and it can worsen their case.”

Dr. Bezner-Kerr said the program addresses these challenges as well as helping farmers who have lost family members to HIV/Aids.

She said the SFHC program encounters challenges all the time, but the goal remains the same; to improve the health, food security and soil fertility.

“I have always been concerned about social justice and environmental sustainability but in meeting other people who are equally committed to these concerns in a place that is facing much greater obstacles, I think it sustains me in this project.”

www.soilandfood.org

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