Date Published: December, 2023
Our flagship livelihood restoration programme over 2022 and 2023 has been Ulimi Ndi Moyo (“agriculture is life”) which has targeted all 367 people affected by the land acquisition and economic displacement process at our Salima and Golomoti projects. We partnered with external specialists to develop and implement the programme, which focused on improving each step of the subsistence farming process.
The first step to improving subsistence agriculture was land preparation. Working together with the project affected people and local commercial agriculture service providers, JCM collectively cleared and ploughed more than 180ha of land at Salima and Golomoti at the end of 2022. Using a learn-by-doing approach, the community members were trained by our field officers on land clearing and preparation so they would have the knowledge and tools to do it themselves in the future.
Following the preparation of the land, the next phase was planting. This focused on the provision of improved seed and fertiliser as well as crop protection kits (knapsack sprayers with herbicides and insecticides). We provided more than eight tonnes of seed and 70 tonnes of fertiliser to the 367 project-affected people. Our field officers provided training on the importance of seed variety selection, how to plant the seeds they were provided with, and the safe application of herbicides.
Leading up to the harvest, those affected by the projects received further training on pest and weed management; crop harvest and residue management; and crop storage and marketing. The harvest of season one of the Ulimi Ndi Moyo programme saw JCM connecting the project-affected people with commercial buyers so they could sell their produce and gain access to the formal market. Typically, smallholder farmers are not always able to participate in the formal market owing to various barriers. JCM worked to remove these barriers by:
Working with a global agricultural company, JCM assisted the project affected people to complete the sale of over 19 tonnes of groundnuts at both the projects combined. For many participants this was the first time they experienced selling to the formal market.
It has been incredible to witness the impact of Ulimi ndi Moyo on the yields that the farmers had in this season. Many of them reported yields of up five times what they achieved in previous years. This means these households would be food secure for the coming year and affirms just how effective improved farming methods and practices can be when they are implemented well.
