Land Rover Farming

I am currently waiting to purchase a 1968 series 3 Land Rover for my farming activities and I'm really excited about the prospect of that. First of all, its the original hardmetal body that Land Rovers are famous for, secondly its a petrol engine and unlike diesel engines, these vehicles don't have a tendency to develop severe engine troubles as they age. Thirdly, it can't get stuck in mud anywhere, its a real offroad vehicle unlike these soft SUVs and pickups we have on the road these days. The real work that I want to do with it is transport Managu (African Nightshade) to Kitengela market which is about 15Km from our farm in Olturoto near Isinya on the Kitengela-Namanga highway. We are just about getting a tractor to come and plough the 3 acre farm.

The beautiful thing about Managu as an indigenous vegetable is that it takes a month to mature. It needs irrigating and since there is a borehole in the farm next door, we are laying down pipes to connect our farm to the water grid. The last crop I had -which was technically my first crop- was Dengu (Green Grams) but these were stunted during the growth stage due to a shortage of rain in November-December last year. They had been advertised as drought tolerant but that turned out not to be so.

Being a new young farmer, I know I still have a lot to learn about farming so I take this dissapointment as a lesson. Despite the loss, I am re-investing myself again into the farming big time. I'm going in hard just like the 1968 Land Rover which is still on the road 45 years later. Even when things don't work out the first time, never give up, always keep going!

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I see Dengu People (Dead People), #Mulla

Last week on Friday, I embarked on the highly tideous and back-breaking affair of planting the dengu (Green Grams) that I got from USAID through their agricultural contractor Fintrac. Fintrac is in charge of the Kenya Horticultural Competitiveness project which aims to increase food production in Kenya. @USAIDKenya sort of wanted to tackle food shortage not by giving food aid but by ensuring that there is enough food being grown locally. It's kind of treating the root causes of famine rather than bandaging the symptoms every year.

I travelled to Machakos Town to the Dryland Seed Company which is one of the outlets that have KEPHIS approved seeds. I picked 15Kgs of the N26 variety which is drought tolerant. I have been planting it since then with the help of local mamas (women) here in Olturuto, Kitengela. Its from these ladies that I learnt that the art of planting was traditionally designated as a woman's job. Good thing gender roles are getting kinda blurred so I can plant in my own farm. There is something Spiritual about putting seeds in the soil, I feel it everyday as I plant. I guess its because as a farmer, you are trusting the soil and the rain to make something out of a tiny seed. Its that tiny seed that holds the blueprint to an entire foliage that will produce flowers and eventually seeds that will be the harvest. That's creation at it's most basic.

This dengu variety takes 65 days to mature, that's just 2 months and five days. Right now we're almost done planting two out of the three acres. I can only say that farming is turning out to be an awesome experience. Today on Twitter, I saw the hashtag #IAmKenyanBecause, started by @Uongozi254 and they wanted to know why we think we are Kenyan and my response was; " #IamKenyanBecause I'm doing what 80% of Kenyans do, #Farming, so that we don't do a #Kenyans4Kenya again."
 

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Networking

Today was a day spent at St. Peter's Cleaver Primary school in downtown Nairobi for the purpose of networking with other farmers. The meeting had been called by a company by the name Rabbit and Rabbit products. The aim of the gathering was to establish a governing council for the Nairobi area comprising of seven representatives who were to be chosen by the farmers.

This gave way to a one hour voting process and the seven were chosen. It is the task of the seven to register a council/cooperative through which the farmers and the company Rabbits and rabbits products will interact. The proposed name of the council is Kenya Commercial Rabbit Council. KCRC will then sign an MOU with Rabbits and Rabbits Products (R&RP) to find a market together for our rabbits as well as distribute their products to farmers. It is poised to be a win-win for both parties as one gets a market for their feeds as the other gets a market for their rabbits.

All in all, it was a very productive venture and as a smaller group within the larger Nairobi group, the Kitengela group is to meet on 3rd December 2011 at our group leader's farm in Mavoko. I am currently making plans to move into the farm in Kitengela permanently from next week because that is when the tractor will till the land in preparation for planting. That's about the time I will also purchase rabbits and take them to the farm with me. I look forward to a quiet farming lifestyle in the plains of Kitengela and moreso to a handsome harvest and plenty of cash :)

fallow land

My family recently acquired three acres of farmland near Kitengela town and it is my intention to put up a greenhouse on the land to produce peppers and other products for sale locally and for export. Having been a poet before, I am now about to make the transition onto farming and hence the title of my blog. This blog will serve the purpose of documenting my journey for the next two years as I dip myself into the world of farming.

The main reason behind my transition is a realization that there isn't much headroom for growth in the poetry industry and a recent major disappointment has only reinforced this. I am thus in search of a more productive path that is not office-related. We have been rearing chicken and I have been the defacto caretaker of those fowls and this will be just an extension of that farming spirit.

The farm is part of a larger portion owned by a family friend and he has built a temporary house on the farm and several Servants' Quarters where he used to house his workers. Did I forget to mention that he used to farm there and has now ceased to do so. Part of the reason why he quit farming is that he suffered major losses for two seasons and was unable to recover from the crop failure. In light of this, I intend to make arrangements for a farming insurance cover to take care of the risks involved and not suffer the same fate.

As part of the farming expedition, I will move into one of the SQ's on site and through that keep a close eye on the activities going on in the farm. My plan is to set up a greenhouse and irrigate with the water on the farm from an earlier existing borehole. To this end, I am about to make contact with a farm solutions provider Amiran Kenya who have special farm kits for small to medium scale farmers. I also talked to another family friend about the challenges he had faced when he was running a greenhouse in his backyard. Among the prominent ones were the sensitivity of the crops given that the greenhouse creates a micro-climate and thus the need to protect that micro-climate from external factors. He cited the fact that at one point he woke up to find the tomatoes he was farming burnt by a disease which he suspects one of the workers brought into the greenhouse the day earlier. The crops are that sensitive. Amiran Kenya however provides special gear for the farmer which is disinfected and worn over regular clothes to minimize the transfer of diseases from the outside world into the greenhouse. In fact, Amiran have a whole support network to ensure that the farmer not only gets a greenhouse but also the appropriate seeds, fertilizers and pesticides as well as market for their produce. This has really encouraged me given that I have no prior training or experience in commercial farming. Their monthly visits to the farm will also be helpful in monitoring the greenhouse and the crops to make sure that everything is going according to plan. To this end, I feel that I am getting into farming with the right people, tools and resources to ensure a bumper harvest and money in the bank. I look forward to a journey of discovery and abundant growth. Amen