Kenya approves commercial farming of GM cotton

BY TONNY ABET

Cabinet of Kenya government yesterday approved the commercial farming of BT cotton following successful completion of field trials conducted for five years.

Bt cotton is a genetically modified pest resistant plant cotton variety, which produces an insecticide to combat bollworm

According to yesterday’s press release, the commercial farming of BT cotton is set to ensure farmers earn more from the crop through increased production.

“It will also boost the manufacturing pillar of the Big 4 Agenda where Kenya seeks to establish itself as a regional leader in textile and apparel production,” read the press release.

Museveni Tips Farmers How To Succeed In The Face Of Climate Change

“Plan for the rains and climate changes, but do not entirely rely on nature in farming,” Museveni tells farmers.

In a Facebook post on last Sunday, the president wrote sharing with farmers his insights on how to succeed in farming in the face of changing climate.

In the post, Museveni articulated that modern farming requires a whole new way of thinking and new sets of tactics for one to thrive.

“Water and pasture can be permanently harnessed and preserved in one place,” Museveni wrote.

He emphasized that farmers need to grow and preserve food for animals just like they do for themselves irrespective of the weather pattern.

According to Museveni, modern agriculture is about seizing and bringing nature under control.

“Modern farming demands that humanity must tame nature and preserve water at all times both for their animals and for irrigation to ensure the growth of pasture and foodstuffs,” the president highlighted.

He added that preserving these will guarantee the feeding of their stock irrespective of the changing climate.

The president's insight comes at a time when heavy down pour is being experienced in most parts of the country. 

According to the information from Rain Water Harvesting Handbook of Uganda's Ministry of Water and Environment, water harvesting is lowly practiced in the country despite the high annual precipitation in most regions.

Rain water harvesting is highly practiced in developed countries like German and Australia.

Different Water Harvesting Technologies in Uganda

Rain Barrels

This is one of the commonest methods in Uganda which involves installing a barrel at a gutter down pour to collect water.

·         Whereas this method is easily implemented because of the availability of barrels and the fact that they don't take up much space, the carrying capacity of barrels are usually very low.

"Dry" System                                                                                                                                 

This is a form of rain barrel set up only differing in the fact that it involves a larger storage volume. In this widely used technology, collection pipe dries after each rain event since it empties directly into top of the tank. This method allows for huge volumes of water to be stored and is thus good for areas where rainfall pattern is unpredictable.

However, the size of your roof being the determining factor for the maximum possible volume of water, it is always hard to fill the tanks which are either plastics or concrete constructions.

"Wet" System

This is spreading technology in Uganda. The method involves locating the collection pipes underground. The tanks are always concrete made constructed underground.

The rain water will fill the underground piping and the water will rise in the vertical pipes until it spills into the tank.

The ability to collect from your entire collection surface and multiple gutters makes this method the choicest. However, the technology is very expensive especially the construction process for underground tanks.

The Vanishing of Bees

GETTY IMAGES

Of all insect-pollinated crops across the global agricultural community, bees contribute 73% of the pollination success. However, the population of these incredible honey-making insects is shrinking at such a drastic rate. Ecologists forecast a great hit on the agricultural sector as nutritionists worry over a skyrocketing price of honey -the nature's ultimate sweet health hub. 

In the U.S, National Agricultural Statistics show a honey bee decline from about 6 million hives in 1947 to 2,4 million in 2008, a 60 % reduction barely in the last 60 years.

Pest management is such a major issue in the agricultural sector. The pests are estimated to be causing at least some 55% crop losses annually. This is a huge loss to the farmers -the sustainers of humanity. Cases of pest attacks such as the fall armyworm caused up to 100% crop losses among some farmers in Africa's Uganda in 2017.

In many instances, the garden infestation of pests is one of the top upsetting incidences that farmers face in their entire gardening career. The pests attacks often get so overwhelming that the farmers start to view every insect as some bad or dangerous crop devourer evil enough to be killed. And the pesticide has always brought farmers such great relieve. A one time spray often guarantees a week or two of a peaceful mind. The assurance that the crops are pest-free and that the nightmare of economic loss has been paused and eliminated is so rewarding to the mind of a farmer whether subsistence or commercial in practicing.

Unfortunately, during the application of these pesticides, the farmers both voluntarily and ignorantly never recognise that whilst there're numerous of those bad insects flickering around in their garden, but also, there're some absolutely essential ones. The pollinators are these essential insects. A number of our crops rely on these pollinators to form their fruits -that we'll inturn call harvest. Soybean, beans, cabbages, tomatoes, cotton, sunflower, and over 800 other crops depend on these pollinators.

Why pollination is not only a scientific term but is central to the success of your farming 

So what is pollination? Well, this is the process by which male sex cells of a plant fertilizes female sex cells of a plant -it's some sort of sexual intercourse between plants or their flowers occurring without your notice. This human-nutrition-sustaining intercourse, however, requires intermediaries to make it a success. The bees are most crucial of many insects that make pollination possible.

How pollination happens

Crop plants that rely on insects bloom out with beautiful coloured flowers. Just as flowers fascinate humans, so are bees thrilled by them as they fly around.  The vast shades of tempting colours and irresistible sweet scents win the heart of the bee into paying a courtesy visit to the flower. Upon successfully being lured into the flower, the flower goes ahead to reward the bee with sweet nectar. This reward of nectar has sustained the bee-flower relationship since plants emerged on the face of the earth.  After sucking the nectar from the flower, the bee flies back to the hive or their colonies.

Strangely, during the struggle to suck as much, the extra sweet nectar for making honey, the bee will transfer the pollen -a male sex cell we talked about earlier -often seen as a yellowish powdery material in a flower, to the stigma -the part of the flower with female sex cell. When this phenomenal transfer is made, a child called a seed and eventually a fruit is unsurprisingly conceived. The fruit then grows into harvest we pick at the end of the season in tomatoes or soybean.

A poorly pollinated watermelon looks like that on the right and a farmer loses. This happens when the bees were too scarce to pollinate the flowers. Pesticide sprays can scare away the bees from coming to pollinate of crops and the economic impact can be high. Sadly, more farmers are experiencing pollinator scarcity.

The threat

Unfortunately, the bees are vanishing and crop pollination is going down. This is leading to shrinking volume in crop harvest. There is also a great increase in volumes of low-grade grains and unmarketable-sized fruits. The major cause is pesticide use. The pesticides not only kill the pests like fruit flies or aphids destroying our crops but they also kill the bees -our ultimate crop pollinator.

How can we protect the population of bees? Let's reduce and where possible stop synthetic pesticide usage. They kill the bees, the innocent and highly valuable insect for our gardens.

There are great alternatives like use of organic repellants. Leaves of the neem tree, cloves of garlic, oranges, and onions (learn how this works) will keep our crops safe from the pests whilst keeping the population of the bees rising to assure us of better crop yield every season. Ozone Biotech does international sales of organic pesticides -pesticides that never kill bees.

The second way is to plant more flowers around our homes and town areas to keep the bees replenished.

The last and most incredible way is to spare some little space and put beehives. Not only will you be harvesting fresh natural honey every after 3 months but you will be sustaining the population of bees to heighten your crop yields seasonally.

The article is written by Abet Tonny, a Ugandan science writer.
Also, feel free to write to me tonnyabet@gmail.com.

Three (3) reasons why you need a Website and Social Media Management Partner or Manager this 2019; Uganda

Credit: getty image

By Abet Tonny

The number of internet users in Uganda has  gone from 40,000 in the year 2000 to 17 million users, this is according to UCC and Africa Internet Stats . Approximately 2.2 million people in Uganda were on Facebook by 2017, guess how many they are in this 2019. And these are clients for your goods and services.

Before we talk much, let us look at the importance of website and social media management.

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1. Gives proof of your organization or company. 

Last time I was talking to a manager in Kenya on phone from my locale in Northern Uganda, what happened to me is what several people across Africa face daily, one of the key companies I was presenting neither had a website nor a social media handle and imagine what happeed, our communication was short-lived because there was no backup (I mean a website or prominent social media handle to support/provide pictorial evidence of presence just with the click of a button). It is very common that whenever you call someone in this era trying to explain that you work with or head such and such a firm or organization, the first thing that runs into the recipient's mind is to instantly type and search to confirm the online existence of that your firm or organization even before he or she gives time to understand the core information you intend to pass. Having no website or at worst a social media handle is equating to absence from the real world,  a ridiculous reality that all business/organization founders in Uganda have had to face. Others lost big deals simply because they did not have the site where they can make fast referals and pictoral evidence readily to pitch better. However, having the website or social media page alone is not the real thing, the core agenda in the mind of your website/page visitor will always be ‘’when was the last time they updated the page/website or blog?’’. Having a great website designed and a killer cover photo on your facebook page is far from the real deal. Infact, it's like a great home of some 1980's government official which was near my former primary school. The home looked so great as you passed the dusty road connecting Lira to Apac district in Northern Uganda, the horrible fact was that the great residential construction had no human beings residing but lizards and wild rats, I remember visiting it once and the overwhelming dust I encountered still remain vivid in my mind. The building stands till this day but I have never had secondary appetite to revisit. It is the same thing happening everytime you spend more than a week without updating your site. An excited partner or client spends time searching for your website or social media handle in 2019 only to find it last updated in 2016, it sucks! Finally and very important, the number of ‘’Likes’’ you have on your facebook page or comments on your blog posts is the way people/visitors determine the worth, value and influence of your products and services.

2. Faster way to boost your brand awareness. 

      Every micro-second, someone  is clicking a URL, visiting a website, reading a blog post or on social media. Remember, with every encounter on your logo or post, the brand awareness is  growing wider and wild. You can take advantage of this!

3. Cheapest way to market and reach new clients. 

      A number of millennials in Uganda still think social media and internet thing is for teenagers and idlers and perhaps they are not decision makers when it comes to real markets.  A great number of these millennials were the marketing managers or program managers in big organizations and companies, this perception was so wrong! A number of them have just joined social media in the last 5 years and they are even more addicted than the teenagers.

Stories short, companies and businesses should now consider social media and blogs as the cheapest way to market. No more prints, from graphics design, your posters go direct to clients. To make your information even sink deeper, attach them inbetween engaging contents/articles written by expert writers around that topic of interest, whether health, agriculture or child right.  I can catagorically state that internet and social media will greatly cut your marketing cost and you need experts in website and social media management to make this a reality to your company/organization.

A radio station that serves 1 millio people will demand at least 1 million UGX to run your advert for a month. A single post you make online, through blog or social media has potential of reaching at least 1 million and the message be sustained for decades. And now with boosting technology, your posts, advert has potential of reaching several millions of people.

The quality of the posts, articles and graphics has exceeding factor in retaining attention of the internet/social media users  to your advert or brand.

Firms in Uganda helping you in website update and social media management

And now, at a monthly fee of only $100 (350,000/=), your company/organization can get a great kick back to life in the online world and bring your clients, partners or even donors to speed with new development in your company/organization .

The Top 4 Lucrative Crops for 2019 -Uganda Farmer

The Top 4 Lucrative Crops for 2019 -Uganda Farmer

 By Tonny Abet 

1. Passion Fruits

Not labour and capital intensive. An acre of passion fruits will require an investment capital of about Shs4.9m. This cost will cover seedlings, manure/fertilizers (compost manure, cow dung, CAN and NPK), labour and pests and diseases management.

If you don’t have a water source, you may need to construct a water tank to harvest run off water. A tank with capacity to accommodate 50,000 litres of water will cost you a minimum of Shs1.5m.

An acre will accommodate 750 seedlings or less depending on the fertility of your soil and consequently spacing. The local purple variety starts flowering as early as three months and peaks at seven months.

A farmer can harvest the fruits for one and half years (72 weeks). Under good agronomic practices, a farmer can harvest a minimum of two bags per week.

This means a farmer can harvest 144 bags in 72 weeks or more. At an average farm gate price of Shs150, 000 per bag, a farmer will bank a gross profit of over Shs21m.

It is important to note that prices can go as high as Shs400, 000 per bag. If the 144 bags are sold at Shs200, 000 per bag, a framer will earn Shs28.8m. What a return on investment!

2. Pumpkins

Pumpkin farming isn’t labour and capital intensive. With an investment capital of about Shs1m, a farmer can earn over Shs6.7m.

This is because an acre will accommodate 450 pumpkin plants since spacing is 10ft*10ft (3 metres) apart. Considering the fact that one pumpkin plant can produce a minimum of 10 pumpkins, 450 plants will give you 4,500 pumpkins and if each is sold at the current farm gate price of Shs1,500, you will earn Shs6.75m in a space of about seven month.

All you need to get best results is apply manure before planting, apply a foliar fertilizer and manage pests and diseases well. It is important to note that a pumpkin can go up to Shs2, 0000

3. Cabbages

This is another vegetable crop that can mint you clean cash when grown during the off season. An acre can accommodate between 19,000 and 40,000 cabbages depending on the variety grown and consequently spacing.

Going by the average farm gate price of Shs700, a farmer can earn between Shs21m and Shs10.5m assuming he harvests 30,000 and 15,000 sizeable cabbages respectively.

An acre requires an investment of about Shs2m. For a farmer to get the best results, he must apply best agronomic practicess.

4. Onion

Although the onion has played second fiddle to conventionally cultivated crops, it might just be the next big thing in 2019. It is a goldmine waiting to be exploited. It can answer your perennial cash difficulties since its commercial potential is enormous. A net of onions weighing between 13-14kg fetches Sh35000 on average or Sh2500 per kg. With proper management a hectare of land can fetch between 14 to 17 tonne. Do the calculation. To obtain even higher returns you can use F1 varieties which have a harvest potential of up to 23 tonnes in a hectare. Most of these varieties only take three months to maturity which makes it possible to cultivate the crop for up to three times in a year. This is in contrast to other crops which can only be cultivated once or twice in a year. These should be your favourite profitable crops, as they all enjoy strong demand year after year, yet can be grown by anyone who has, or can learn a few basic gardening skills.