Field Work in Kaberamaido

I have had the privilege to participate in some trainings on Farming God's Way (FGW) with the people from KMDP (the Kaberamaido Pentecostal church development organization).  Moses, KMDP's program manager, went to the FGW training in Kenya with me and one of the other KMDP staff members, Joy, had attended a shorter training in Uganda.  They wanted to set up some demonstration gardens with a couple communities that they work with and asked me to come do the training with them.  The hope is that this technique will help farmers to protect and improve their soil and as a result, ultimately improve their crop yields.

We enjoyed giving a demonstration of how mulching helps to prevent erosion during the rains.

Comparing the water washed off the un-mulched and mulched "fields".

Marking spacing on the ropes they would use for measuring out locations of planting holes:

Clearing the garden space ("weeding like you're never going to weed again")

Digging holes:

Mulching the field:

Checking on the garden a few weeks later, after the plants have germinated.

The participants were a little bit dismayed that their crops have been chewed on by the neighbor's goats and turkeys (since the dry season is about to start, people have released their animals, assuming that no one is growing crops anymore).  Nevertheless, they could see that the plants that were mulched are bigger and there are far fewer weeds growing amongst them.  One man also said how much he appreciated the emphasis on weeding every 10-14 days, before the weeds get a chance to grow too big.