FHF Intern Update - 10 days to go!

We visited 40 farms in Othaya last week and learned some important information that will help FHF members when they come in January. Some points I have noticed is that the milk production, per animal is on average lower then those in Wakulima. Also, only about ½ of the farmers we talked to use a teat dip after milking. Most of the farmers there feed napier grass and maize plants as the main staples of the animals diet. As well, dairy meal and pollard was fed at most farms.
This week we arrived in Embu to begin work on our final project for FHF. The Embu dairy has received funding for 50 biogas units. In preparation for the biogas, we are visiting the potential biogas farms to see how they cook now, etc. Biogas in Embu is rare, and most use firewood to cook with. Some use charcoal and paraffin. Everyone is excited about the prospect of biogas coming. Stephen and Faith, the FHF staff at Embu, are accompanying us around to each farm. They are very enthusiastic about the future of the dairy. Stephen noted that he was trying to convince some farmers in one area to grow maize as a crop for the cattle, but people in the area were very resistance to change and did not want to try anything new!
The three of us have noticed the difference in the farms and animals at the Othaya and Embu dairy, compared to those in Wakulima. The housing is especially different I found – in wakulima all farms have zero grazing units with a concrete base, while in Othaya and Embu they weren’t as common.
Today we are in Nairobi because Chelsea’s mom is coming for our last week here. We are picking her up at the airport and then heading back to Embu. Saturday we are planning a big ‘feast’ at our driver, Dominic’s house in Thika. He invited us for a dinner with his LARGE family (over 50). We are going to roast a goat and eat chapatti’s!! It will be quite the experience I’m sure!
That’s all for now - Cheers.

Julie Mutch

Three weeks to go!

Well the last couple weeks have been very busy here in Kenya! We finished our work with the Wakulima Dairy and last week Dr. LaCroix , the dean of science at UPEI came to check up on us. As part of our internship with Students for Development, a representative from the University has to come see us! We toured him around the Dairy, went to see the biogas units, and interviewed those that will be receiving the biogas units. Dr. LaCroix also got to experience Kenyan tea ( half milk, half sugar, half tea !haha), and driving on the dirt roads when it is pouring rain!

One of the days was spent doing focus groups with farm women who ship milk to the Dairy. Dr. LaCroix accompanied us as well. We learnt SO much from them about the role the Dairy plays in their lives, why it is hard to get women to run for elected positions at the Dairy, as well as who makes the financial decisions in the family.

Here is the first group we talked to. They were all so helpful and had great responses to our questions.

At the end of the week we went on a safari to Samburu Game Park. We saw lots of elephants, zebras and giraffes, and we also saw two lions which was pretty neat.

After our safari we rode some camels.....that was fun! Except we were quite sore the next day!

On his last day here, we all went into Nairobi for a city tour. In the evening we went to the famous Carnivore Restaurant accompanied by our travel agent (whom many of you know), Henry. It was a great way to end the week!

The last few days, we have been in Mombasa for a mini-vacation! We got lots of sun and had an overall great time! The drive was long...7 hours each way but it was worth it!

Now we are into our final 3 weeks here in Kenya. Time has really flown by!

On Monday we are starting our work with the Othaya Dairy. We have between 30-50 farm visits to make. The information we are gathering will be used by FHF in the coming years.

Next weekend we are moving to Embu for our final 2 weeks!

Cheers,
Julie M.

Milk Run!

This week we had the opportunity to go on the milk run with the Wakulima Dairy and talk to the farmers about the impact the Dairy has had on their families and community. The run started at 11 am when we met our driver Bernard at the Dairy.
There are 2 milk runs for the dairy every day. One starts at 3am and the other starts at 11am. There are 4 truck routes, and some people that live close to the dairy take it directly there. We COULD have gone on the route that started at 3am...but I needed my beauty sleep you know! The route we took in the truck with Bernard took 4 hours and we had 30 pickups and collected 2500 litres.

Luckily it wasn’t raining so the roads weren’t terrible, but in the long rainy season (April and May) they have a big problem with the trucks getting stuck on the roads, and thus, the milk will spoil sitting in the truck. The dairy has even fixed some of the roads themselves because the government would not. Bernard told us that the Dairy has discussed getting refrigerated trucks so that spoiled milk will not be a problem.

When the Dairy first started in 1991, their first milk shipment was 35 litres from 32 members. Now, they collect 27,000 litres daily.

The 3am milking goes to the Dairy where it is cooled in the tank which was bought by Farmers Helping Farmers. The 11am milking goes directly to the processing plant, Brookside, which is about 60 km away. Before the cooling tank was added, milk was only picked up once a day because the evening milk would spoil before they could get it to the processor.
So back to the milk run.... on each truck there is a quality control person, a recorder, and a helper. They sit in the back with the milk cans. The truck has scheduled stops along the road. Everyone waits there with their pink milk production card and their can of milk. Most of them have between 5 and 10 litres of milk at each pickup. Their milk is weighed, and then recorded on their production card. The card is passed into the dairy at the end of each month and then the money is put directly into their bank account at the Wakulima SACCO .

It was really neat- everyone on the route knew who we were (the farmers from Canada), and kept coming up to us and thanking us for all the Canadians have done for them. It is one thing to see the funds that have been invested into the Dairy, but it means so much more when the people who were most affected by the improvements, personally thank you for making their lives better.

Oh, and our driver – Bernard. He has been working at the Dairy for 3 years. He was previously a driver in Nairobi for 7 years. He is at the dairy at 2am for the first milk run, and doesn’t return until 10 pm, after he take the afternoon milk to the processor. He works for 25 days, and then gets 5 days off. His family lives 10 km away from the Dairy, but he can’t live there because it is too far away and he has no means of transportation. He travels home for 5 days every month. If it wasn’t for the Dairy, Bernard would still be working in Nairobi as a driver and sending money home to his family – like so many in these areas do. Now, he can go home and see his family on a regular basis. He also contributes to the local community.

This coming week we are happy that Dr. LaCroix from UPEI will be joining us. We have lots to show him and are looking forward to his arrival on Sunday!

Until next time,
Julie Mutch

We are working in Mukure-ini now

Hello Readers,

We are currently in Mukurwe-ini working with the Wakulima Dairy. The past 2 weeks have been relatively uneventful as we have been doing a lot of data entry etc.

Last Sunday however we attended church services at a girl’s secondary school in Meru with Jennifer. It was fun and the girls were all very interested in us. I recently (through Farmers Helping Farmers) donated funds to pay for a girl’s secondary education, and while at the church services was able to meet the girl. It was very touching.

Last Monday we came to Ishamara and to even hotter weather than Meru. We had meetings with Duncan in the beginning of the week, he is such a helpful man. We spent the next two days interviewing all the members of the board of directors for Wakulima. Regina came with us to translate and show us where to go, what an amazingly helpful woman.

Yesterday we spent the day talking to the staff, management and customers of the Wakulima Dairy SACCO. The customers are so interesting and had a lot of really good answers, and most if not all told us how thankful they were for the Dairy. When asked what impact the Dairy has had on her life one woman looked at me and said ‘’now we are full!’’ while patting her belly.

Next week we will be going to do work at the Dairy itself, as well as on a milk run, which we are all excited about. Also, we are patiently counting down the days until Dr C. Lacroix comes from UPEI (seven more).

Chelsea Morrison

Kinyinjere Primary School

by Julie Mutch

Another week has gone by in our internship to Kenya and we spent the week with members of the Muchui Women’s Group. At the end of the week we spent the day at Kinynjere Primary School. The school is twinned with a class at Tracadie School on PEI.
The purpose of our visit to the school was to hand out mosquito nets to the special needs class, as well as the nursery kids ( kindergarten ). We handed out nets to the rest of the school 2 weeks ago. This is the first time most of them would have mosquito nets to sleep under. The kids were very excited to see us again. After we handed them nets, the children began singing for us. They were so good! Eventually, more of the children came out of their classrooms and joined in. ( I don’t think much work got done that day in class!)
During the lunch break, we passed out candy to every student at the school. They were very excited to receive a small gift! Also during lunch, we invited all the students out onto the football field and gave them a brand new football ( soccer ball to us). Last time we were at the school we noticed that they were playing football with a small piece of rubber taped together, so we decided we would get them a new football to play with at lunch. The girls played a game, then the boys. We somehow then got asked to come into a couple classrooms while the teachers were having lunch. The students asked us to teach them something. Anything at all. All they wanted to do was learn. We let them ask us questions - about anything at all and tried our best to answer them! They were very curious about the Canadian school system and how it was different, and Katie got some questions on biology as well!
In the afternoon we held a small focus group with children that have a parent in the Muchui group. There were 6 at that school. We asked them about the women’s group and how it has made a difference in their lives. Their responses were excellent, and heartbreaking at the same time. Most explained that before they had water tanks( from the women’ s group) , they would have to miss school to walk to get water from the stream, and that many times they would not have any food at their house and the women’s group would feed them. Now, because of the group, their parents are making some money, and able to plant tree seedlings and sell them. They all realized that education was the only way out of poverty for them, and that farming in that area was very tough because of drought.
This coming week we are continuing our work with the Muchui Group. It will be our last week in Meru!

Ruuju Women's GRoup

Ruuju Women’s Group

by Julie Mutch
It is hard to believe that it is the end of our third week here in Kenya. This past week we were working with the Ruuju Women’s Group. The hour long trek out to Ruuju is an adventure in itself, and I must say I won’t be missing that part!
Shaad, the FHF Field officer here in Kenya that oversees the 5 projects was our driver all week. It was really fun having him join us. For anyone that has met Shaad, he is very fun to be around and always knows the answer to every question you have! I don’t know what we are going to do without him around! Though, he will be coming to check up on us as we move through the projects during our 12 weeks.
Our task at Ruuju was to gather information about the women in the group, and also to gather some information on the FHF Council. We conducted 30 interviews at member’s farms throughout the week and two members of the group acted as translators for us. All of the women we met were very kind and welcoming to us. We got to see a wide variety of farms, anywhere from 1/8 acre to 17 acre farms. We also saw how much the women’s group has done for the community. All of the women were very thankful for the group. Through the group, the women have received water tanks, farm animals, bedding, kitchen utensils, school fees, just to name a few. We also got to see what the women grew on their farms, and what they would like to grow in the future. The main reason that these women lost a lot of their crop was because of drought and disease.
As a thank you to the women for allowing us to visit their farms, we gave each woman 5 packages of seeds donated by Vesey’s Seeds in York, PEI. They were very thankful for the seeds. Though nothing was expected from the women besides their time and willingness to answer our questions, we received many gifts in return. We took home two live chickens (which I’m sure we’ll be having for supper some day soon...!), many bananas, black beans, ground nuts, papayas, avocado, squash, fresh eggs, and one member even gave us handmade fruit baskets.
The response from the women was overwhelming. Even though those these women have very little, they still were quite happy to give us so much.
Next week we are starting our work with the Muchui Women’s Group. We will be working with them for the next two weeks.

Rael Kimathi uses drip irrigation to grow green vegetables and tomatoes on her small farm.

by Teresa Mellish

Rael Kimathi is a very good farmer. Her homestead has many trees and her crops always look the best in the area, even in the drought. Her farm is located beside the Muchui Business Centre and she is both a sponsor of the Centre and benefits from the technologies at the Centre. She is member of the Muchui Womens Group and her daughter, Salome, works at the Muchui Business Centre. She has donated a piece of land to the Muchui Womens Group for the “mother plot” where they have planted the improved varieties of macadamia, passion fruit, bananas and mangoes to be used for grafting.

She is now building a big greenhouse on her farm- which will use drip irrigation to grow tomatoes for sale. She is already scaling up the technology Farmers Helping Farmers introduced to the Muchui Womens Group

When I visited the Kiirua district last week, it was dry and very windy. No crops were growing and the area did not receive the last rains. Rains are expected in mid-October and always optimistic farmers are plowing and preparing the land to sow seeds before the rain.

This is where the members of the Muchui Womens Group farm. Each of the members has a water tank and most of them are hooked up to the water pipe which brings water from Mount Kenya into the area. However there is no rain water in the tanks and it is expensive to purchase water from the water pipes; it costs 250 Kenya shillings (CAD$4) to fill the 4600 litre water tank. Consequently water is used frugally and sparingly.

It was so wonderful to see some green crops amidst the otherwise brown vegetation on the three farms I visited. These farms are using drip irrigation in their kitchen gardens to grow kale for home consumption. As a result, the diets of these families includes kale, served in the form of “sukuma wiki”- much like boiled spinach or swiss chard with onions.

We also saw drip irrigation in the small greenhouses which are being used to grow tomatoes for home consumption and for sale. The variety of tomatoes has been developed for greenhouses. Rael Kimathi said she has already sold tomatoes worth 1000 shillings.

The drip irrigation pipes lay on the ground and have a small hole at spaced intervals to allow water to drip out at exactly the same place as one kale plant is located. No water is lost to evaporation.

This has been possible for two reasons. The technology and materials for drip irrigation are available in Kenya because of the large scale greenhouses used to grow vegetables and flowers for export from Kenya. When we were in Kenya in January, 2007, we found a supplier of the pipes for the Muchui Women members.

Six donors to our 2006 Christmas campaign each donated $100 for a vegetable garden for a family. We used these funds to set up the six greenhouses at the homes of six members of the Muchui Womens Group to demonstrate the drip irrigation.

As a result, all of the 62 Muchui group members now want drip irrigation!! Martin, horticulturist at the Muchui Business Centre, priced the drip irrigation materials for the members. The 1200 shillings required to purchase the drip materials was obtained by selling maize to the Business Centre and providing an additional 300 shillings each.

We continue to be amazed by the willingness of the Muchui Group members to try new technology. These women are traditional farmers who are not in a position to risk anything. There are several women in the group, such as Rael Kimathi. who are exceptionally good farmers and who are always the first to try new methods. The others see the new technology and then are willing to use it on their farms. Our lesson is that with appropriate technology and financial support direct to the farms, we can help improve the quality of their lives.

We will continue to work with these women to identify new crops and different ways for them to grow food to support their families.