The GROW BIOINTENSIVE Sustainable smaller scale Farmer Training and Crop Production
Date Published:
The GROW BIOINTENSIVE
Sustainable smaller scale Farmer Training and Crop Production
The proposed training program will be an opportunity for the scale for the smaller scale farmers to learn valuable GROW BIOINTENSIVE techniques, to experience an alternative living style, to make lifelong ties with other participants from different small-scale farming communities. The program will be a combination of lectures, study and garden work. Once participants have completed this training program it is hoped they will become successful small-scale farmers, building sustainable food security across the communities and around the country.
Introduction
The small-scale farmers in remote parts of western Kenya are currently facing a series of environmental and humanitarian challenges that include climate change, soil depletion, water shortages, overpopulation, peak oil and a shortage of farmers. All of these challenges impact the effectiveness and sustainability of the food supply chain that the majority of farmers and urban dwellers around western Kenya have come to rely upon for their food: a chain that has become dependent on chemical-based, conventional agriculture, and the fossil-fuel intensive fertilizers and pesticides methods that make them possible.
To address these challenges it is necessary to for farmers to learn to use sustainable, smaller-scale farming methods that will allow them to increase yields while conserving resources and minimizing environmental damage. Farmers educated in these methods will have skills that allow them to thrive in both rural and semi-urban farming environments, and will provide a solid foundation for creating resilient local food webs that can survive challenges and foster community spirit better than industrialized mega-farms.
The Program
The community Mobilization Against Poverty, CMAP, is offering a unique training program to teach farmers to use the GROW BIOINTENSIVE Sustainable Mini-Farming method, which will allow them to attain high yields at low cost, while conserving resources and building soil fertility. The program leverages CMAP’s 15+ years of experience in GROW BIOINTENSIVE agriculture, which includes access to a group of exceptional Master Farmers.
GROW BIOINTENSIVE mini-farming techniques, when properly implemented, have the potential allow farmers to:
• Use 67% to 88% less water than conventional agricultural methods.
• Use 50% to 100% less purchased (organic, locally available) fertilizer.
• Use up to 99% less energy than commercial agriculture, while using a fraction of the resources.
• Produce 2 to 6 times more food at intermediate yields, assuming a reasonable level of farmer skill and soil fertility (which increase over time as the method is practiced)
• Produce a 100% increase in soil fertility.
• Reduce by 50% or more the amount of land required to grow a comparable amount of food.
The program will take place in Research, training and Demonstration farm located in Machungwa community, Transnzoia County, Western Kenya. Participants will learn practical skills that address issues of sustainability and soil fertility that affect market farmers, through a combination of hands-on fieldwork and classroom teaching. The techniques taught will be a closed system, soil building, organic approach to food production; in addition, participants will learn about positive social solutions to food insecurity. Because the Grow Biointensive method is well suited for use in rural and semi-urban smaller-scale farming environments, this program will help farmers address the growing interest among businesses and consumers in using food sourced as locally as possible, produced using organic and sustainable methods.
The program will be led by a group of 4 Master Farmers (CMAP coordinating officer Moses Mukongo, Lilian Akinyi CMAP’s training and research assistant, Grace Lugongo CMAP’s training and research assistant and Amos Wanga, CMAP’s training and research assistant. The training will give participants an education encompassing aspects of building and maintaining soil fertility, growing food, and developing a strong community, with a primary focus on learning the GROW BIOINTENSIVE method for building productive, sustainable food and market farms.
To broaden the impact and reach of this program, the teaching sessions will be filmed, and developed into a seminar series. This will provide an efficient means to distribute the information to as many people as possible; it will exponentially increase the positive effect the Master Farmers’ expertise can have, allowing people across the region to access to information that can help them create solutions to the challenges facing us all.
Sustainable smaller scale Farmer Training and Crop Production
The proposed training program will be an opportunity for the scale for the smaller scale farmers to learn valuable GROW BIOINTENSIVE techniques, to experience an alternative living style, to make lifelong ties with other participants from different small-scale farming communities. The program will be a combination of lectures, study and garden work. Once participants have completed this training program it is hoped they will become successful small-scale farmers, building sustainable food security across the communities and around the country.
Introduction
The small-scale farmers in remote parts of western Kenya are currently facing a series of environmental and humanitarian challenges that include climate change, soil depletion, water shortages, overpopulation, peak oil and a shortage of farmers. All of these challenges impact the effectiveness and sustainability of the food supply chain that the majority of farmers and urban dwellers around western Kenya have come to rely upon for their food: a chain that has become dependent on chemical-based, conventional agriculture, and the fossil-fuel intensive fertilizers and pesticides methods that make them possible.
To address these challenges it is necessary to for farmers to learn to use sustainable, smaller-scale farming methods that will allow them to increase yields while conserving resources and minimizing environmental damage. Farmers educated in these methods will have skills that allow them to thrive in both rural and semi-urban farming environments, and will provide a solid foundation for creating resilient local food webs that can survive challenges and foster community spirit better than industrialized mega-farms.
The Program
The community Mobilization Against Poverty, CMAP, is offering a unique training program to teach farmers to use the GROW BIOINTENSIVE Sustainable Mini-Farming method, which will allow them to attain high yields at low cost, while conserving resources and building soil fertility. The program leverages CMAP’s 15+ years of experience in GROW BIOINTENSIVE agriculture, which includes access to a group of exceptional Master Farmers.
GROW BIOINTENSIVE mini-farming techniques, when properly implemented, have the potential allow farmers to:
• Use 67% to 88% less water than conventional agricultural methods.
• Use 50% to 100% less purchased (organic, locally available) fertilizer.
• Use up to 99% less energy than commercial agriculture, while using a fraction of the resources.
• Produce 2 to 6 times more food at intermediate yields, assuming a reasonable level of farmer skill and soil fertility (which increase over time as the method is practiced)
• Produce a 100% increase in soil fertility.
• Reduce by 50% or more the amount of land required to grow a comparable amount of food.
The program will take place in Research, training and Demonstration farm located in Machungwa community, Transnzoia County, Western Kenya. Participants will learn practical skills that address issues of sustainability and soil fertility that affect market farmers, through a combination of hands-on fieldwork and classroom teaching. The techniques taught will be a closed system, soil building, organic approach to food production; in addition, participants will learn about positive social solutions to food insecurity. Because the Grow Biointensive method is well suited for use in rural and semi-urban smaller-scale farming environments, this program will help farmers address the growing interest among businesses and consumers in using food sourced as locally as possible, produced using organic and sustainable methods.
The program will be led by a group of 4 Master Farmers (CMAP coordinating officer Moses Mukongo, Lilian Akinyi CMAP’s training and research assistant, Grace Lugongo CMAP’s training and research assistant and Amos Wanga, CMAP’s training and research assistant. The training will give participants an education encompassing aspects of building and maintaining soil fertility, growing food, and developing a strong community, with a primary focus on learning the GROW BIOINTENSIVE method for building productive, sustainable food and market farms.
To broaden the impact and reach of this program, the teaching sessions will be filmed, and developed into a seminar series. This will provide an efficient means to distribute the information to as many people as possible; it will exponentially increase the positive effect the Master Farmers’ expertise can have, allowing people across the region to access to information that can help them create solutions to the challenges facing us all.
