Title of project: ADAPCC IMPLEMENTATION PROGRAMME AT MICHIMIKURU TEA COMPANY LIMITED

Name of the organization:MICHIMIKURU TEA COMPANY LIMITED

Type of organization: PRODUCER ORGANIZATION

Commodity: TEA

Name of contact person: FRANCIS N. MWAI

City/Country: KENYA

Email: fmwai@michimikuru.ktdateas.com

Telephone:O720372297/0202111517/0202342900

Website:www.ktdateas.com/factories/michimikuru

ADAPCC IMPLEMENTATION

• The concept of AdapCC in Michimikuru started in 2007 when farmers and other stake holders were interviewed through questionnaires.

• All those farmers interviewed admitted that there have been considerable changes in climate patterns.

Scenario such as Inadequate rainfall exhibited in;• Delayed rainfall (droughts)• Destructive rainfall• Reduced rainfall• Increased wind velocity due to reduced forest cover etc.• Increase in temperature leading to increase in pest and

diseases e.g. malaria and typhoid.

In November 2008 AdapCC Risk and Opportunity Analysis (ROA) was conducted at Michimikuru in which farmers and stakeholders met in participatory workshop where the following problems were cited:

• Deforestation• Lack of alternative energy• Crop failure• Tea monoculture • Lack of environmental education• Lack of money

• The Problems were then subjected to a regional workshop with multi disciplinary experts and as a result three adaptation Strategies were identified for immediate implementation.

These are;

• 1)Energy use efficiency

• (2)Soil and Water management

• (3)Crop diversification

ADAPCC APPROACH STRUCTURE

ADAPCC

Crop diversification to fight tea monoculture

Soil&Water management

Energy use efficiency

River bank protection& a forestation

Soil-waterconservatio

n

Nutritional food supply Staple food Income

generation

Farmer Household

level

Factory Level

Crop diversification

• The farmers in Michimikuru and indeed farmers in most of the tea growing areas in kenya have for long depended on tea monoculture in a belief that tea would generate enough income to buy food with.

• With low incomes from tea due to increase in family size, there has been a food security problem to the extent that nutritional diseases like marasmic kwashiorkor had started showing on children. Farmers also needed to diversify for income.

• Crop diversification was approached in 3 dimensions:

(a) Nutritional food supply:

• vegetable crops like Spinach, onions and Carrots were introduced in 15 demo plots evenly distributed within the tea catchment.

• Since most of the land is under tea, the productivity of the remaining little land must be increased through modern farming methods.

• General farm layout- A family with one acre of land has ½ under tea ¼ acre homestead and livestock and ¼ for subsistence farming.

I) Double Digging Plot

• This breaks the hard pan thereby enhancing water and nutrient availability. The method allows increase of plant population optimally.

• Increased plant population hence increased productivity per unit area of land.• 2290 number of farmers in the catchment Initially adopted these farming methodologies, with 47,982

vegetable seedlings from our nurseries and the rest from their own nurseries.

II)MULTI-STOREY GARDEN

• Ideal for tenants and residential factory workers and even farmers who may have utilized their entire land and where land for kitchen gardening is not available.

• Quite a number of factory workers have adopted.

(b) Staple food supply

• For the daily ration to be adequate, Starch should form the bulk of the ration .On this realization we sat with the farmers to select the best crops. It was unanimously agreed that the almost forgotten traditional crops were both nutritional and more adaptable to the environment .

• The crops below were the few that we started with. Therefore, bulking sites were established in the factory compound with the aim of distributing the planting materials to the farmers at an affordable price.

1. Sweet potatoes

Bulking sites for improved varieties of sweet potatoes from KARI .The vines were availed to the needy farmers to continue multiplying to rest.A substantial amount of vines have been planted by the farmers and a multiply effect is significant.

2. Cassava

• Improved cassava from KARI bulking site.• Few farmers adopted

Adoption by farmers

(c)Income supplementation

• This is meant to supplement the income from tea in order to spread the risks of falling tea prices.

4. Passion fruits

• Passion fruit is a lucrative business and the ministry of agriculture is very supportive in terms of technical advice, sourcing of clean planting seedlings as well as looking for market.

• 30 contact farmers were trained on passion fruits husbandry. The adoption is slow due to limited supply of certified seedlings and cost.

• Along with the above components, soil fertility management is critical and need to be addressed so as to produce the crops optimally. Farmers have been shown how to improve soil fertility using cheap and locally available materials.

Compost manure

• 2891 growers were trained during grower field days on this technology and about 40 growers immediately adopted though this was greatly affected by the drought due to lack of water and therefore materials. The adoption continued significantly.

SOIL AND WATER MANAGEMENT

• It is evident that people have encroached on water springs hence leading to their drying up.

• The wet lands have equally been exposed. People have cultivated on the riparian areas thus polluting the rivers and increasing soil erosion. Tree cover has been reduced considerably to allow for human habitation and farming, thus exposing the soil which has led to soil erosion. This component therefore addresses the issue of soil and water conservation in the following ways;

(A) Protecting all the wetlands (springs) and the riverbanks

• We selected 5 rivers to serve as demos sites .The farmers whose farms border the rivers were sensitized on the importance of river bank protection .On realization of the importance of the river bank protection, these farmers allowed experts from the Ministry of Agriculture to survey, map and peg the riparian areas with a view to rehabilitating them .Trees that are considered to be not eco friendly on such sites were cut down and indigenous trees which are known to enhance water conservation were planted.. Farmers formed conservation associations to protect the mapped out riparian areas .They further elected 4 river bank scouts for each river who were then trained on various aspects of soil and water management by the Ministry of Agriculture (Environment department) and issued with certificates. The ministry also donated appropriate literature on wetlands protection and supplied equipment like spirit level to assist in construction of soil and water conservation structures.

Area MP & assistant minister for east Africa co-operation presiding over river bank protection scout graduation and

launching.

• The scouts oversee the management of the riparian areas and ensure that there is no illegal encroachment any more. Billboards have been erected at strategic points along the rivers to indicate what is going on.

So far 15 rivers have been successfully protected and the job is on going with 60 river bank scout members.

• Eucalyptus trees species that are non water friendly along the river, being cut down

Nursery expanded to a capacity of 150,000 with 13 different species

• This is a demonstration of riparian strip in the nucleus estate for growers to appreciate the expected results.

(b)Agro-forestry

• Depletion of tree cover has been identified as a problem. On discussions it was decided that there should be an aggressive programme to replace the same. It was further noted that as much as possible and due to diminishing land size, the choice of trees should include those that are commonly regarded as agro forest.

(c)Establishment of forest corners in our schools.

• Our children, who own the future should be in the front line in the course of winning the battle of deforestation. In this regard it was decided that all schools should be incorporated into the programme. School heads and their chairpersons were called to a workshop and they came up with their own strategy, which include among others establishment of forest corners in their school compounds. The types of tree species to increase the forest cover and to serve as gene bank for endangered species were also identified.

IRINDIRO PRIMARY SCHOOL ESTABLISHING A FOREST CORNER IN THEIR SCHOOL COMPOUND.

• Note the coaching and demonstration by the Michimikuru project liaison officer.

A GENE BANK ESTABLISHED AT MICHIMIKURU ESTATE TO CONSERVE THE ENDAGERED TREE SSP.

50 DIFFERENT INDGENOUS SPECIES OF WHICH 6 ARE THREATENED WITH EXTICTION ARE BEING CONSERVED.

• Michimikuru Tea Company has established an arboretum where it continues to collect seedlings from far and wide to make sure that the gene bank so established is rich.

Endangered indigenous forest trees in the verge of drying after the bark is removed for medicinal purposes

NTAMICHIU PRIMARY SCHOOL

• A michimikuru staff distributing seedlings to the pupils• This school is situated in eco-climatic zone 5 which is dry and desert like.

• Protection of further destruction of government forests in our neighborhood

Michimikuru company has partnered with Kenya forest department to make sure no further encroachment and destruction of public forests takes place. In this regard, we have assisted three Kenya forest guards with company houses in order for them to be within our reach. we also facilitate with transport where necessary.

• Education on the use of affordable soil and water conservation measures has been done through barazas, demonstrations, field days and farm visits .This also has been extended outside our tea catchment area.

Management of Tea Prunings

• Farmers have been taught to leave tea prunings in situ to enhance soil fertility, water retention and check run off. This is so, despite the acute shortage of firewood in the tea catchment area.

• Pruned tea with prunings left Intact in the estate

• Various aspects of GAP in tea farming have been disseminated through demos,barazas,field days and farm visits and among them is;

Infilling of all the empty spaces in the tea farms.

in this regard, farmers were encouraged to start their own tea nurseries using the TRFK recommended clones with high soil nutrient utilization efficiency. Our T.E.A.s assist the farmers to identify these clones in their farms.

• Methods of bringing tea into bearing with an objective of enhancing faster soil cover without affecting rooting system as well as contour planting and adopting the lowest possible NPK fertilizer application rates in both young and mature teas have been put in place. The recommendation from TRFK in mature tea is between150 kgs -200kgs N/ HA and we have adopted 150N/HA.

A cheap way of rehabilitating gullies is through planting of first growing trees as gabion

construction is capital intensive.

• Women group mobilized and supplied with eucalyptus gradis seedlings to rehabilitate a gully at Muthara Market along Maua-Meru main road.

3) ENERGY SAVING

• This component was approached in two dimensions; Energy saving at factory level and energy saving at farmer

household level

ENERGY SAVING AT FACTORY LEVEL

• An energy audit was done which highlighted the adoption needs in the following areas and so far changes made have yielded huge savings.

• Use of energy saving bulbs- The factory has replaced ordinary bulbs with energy saving ones including at the workers living quarters. Further, the factory has adapted use of energy saving motors in the recent expansion of the withering area where motors have been installed. These actions have resulted to a 30% saving on electricity consumption.

• Boiler efficiency. Proper maintenance, including avoidance of leaks, and use of cured wood has led to savings and which savings have improved returns to the farmers.

• Fire wood sheds. Previously the factory used to live from hand to mouth, i.e. using wet firewood directly from harvest fields. This used to consume a lot of energy to get rid of the moisture. It was felt that the wood should be cured first before using it in the boiler. Firewood sheds to allow for such curing were constructed and now efficiency has been enhanced and savings have been realized.

• Exploration of alternative energy source. During the audit, it was realized that fuel costs, especially the fossil based, were escalating by the day. It was therefore felt that the factory should explore alternative sources. After weighing the options, wind energy was considered to be more reliable. So far, a pre feasibility study has been done by Engineers; Murdoch of Imani Development (UK) and Japhet Sayi (KTDA Ltd ) with encouraging results courtesy of Café direct through Imani Development. A concept paper has been done and now the company is looking for partners to conduct a full feasibility study and there after do the implementation .In this regard the factory intends to produce 3 megawatts of electricity from where she can use one megawatt while the balance is sold to the national grid. The green energy so produced will go along way in reducing green house gases as well as generating income to the farmers and by extension mitigating against climate change.

ENERGY SAVING AT FARMER HOUSEHOLD LEVEL.• 30 households were selected in the initial stages to serve as

demonstration sites where 15 jiko kisasa and 15 rocket were installed.

• At planning level it was realized that more than 98% of the farmers use firewood. They were using the traditional three stones, a method that consumes a lot of firewood. It was therefore decided that the farmers should be introduced to the tested modern energy saving stoves. Since the factory did not have this capacity, the German Technical Cooperation (GTZ ) and Private Sector Development in Agriculture (PSDA) personnel were invited to collaborate and since then a great achievements have been made on this. Results from the demos that were installed in households so far indicate that there can be savings of between 30 and 70% on fuel wood depending on the type of stove. These results created a lot of interest and about 2000 farmers adopted the stoves within a short span.

Jiko Kisasa stove in one of the households

Rocket Energy Saving Stove in another household. This a more efficient and therefore expensive stove,

only affordable by fewer people.

Method of installation .• The GTZ/PSDA trained installers on the job. The idea was to

train as many installers as possible but upon assessment and evaluation only thirty graduated and received certificates.

• These are expected to carry the programme further on commercial basis although with the understanding that the materials which they use will be from accredited PSDA suppliers and as per the PSDA/GTZ recommended design.

Graduates of energy stoves installation together with Board of Directors, Project Liaison Officer and Factory Unit Manager

CHALLENGES• Cultural beliefs.• Logistics• Lack of Money• Prolonged drought• Structural design and implementation.

COLLABORATION. • During the adaptation process it was realized that for the

programme to progress, women groups had to be involved as the men were not spreading the word as fast as was expected. The Ministry of Social services (the Maendeleo Ya Wanawake) were put on board and this yielded the desired results.

THE END

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