By Joyce Gyekye
To tell the world that there are alternatives to inorganic fertilisers and pesticides, some young people who participated in the First Thousand Africa Youth Summit on food systems and agroecology exhibited products that are environmentally friendly, like organic fertilisers and weedicides.
They also showcased value-added agricultural products sourced from agro-ecological farms.
The summit held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in mid-October 2024 was attended by about 300 youth in person and more than 1,000 virtually.
The event was organised by the youth wing of the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa, AFSA with sponsorship from the parent organisation, the Ethiopian government and partners.
Frank Kisamo from Tanzania exhibited bio-fertilizer.
The motivation, he said, stems from the financial drain that the high cost of chemical fertilisers had on his parents, who were smallholder farmers. Now Director of Frank Kisamo, KSM, he educated himself during the COVID-19 shutdown through YouTube and came out with home made compost.
“I came up with an idea of compost made out of banana peels and the common one, cow dung,” said Frank Kisamo.
The outcome of his parent’s harvest after applying his biofertilizer led to increased vegetables, as that was what they cultivated. This attracted neighbours and family members and compelled him to improve upon his formula, which led to increased production and money.
He said for now, “we have seven full time people, more than 10 volunteers and for the selling matrix, we serve more than 3,000 customers.” With no government support in terms of funding, Frank consoles himself with the support he got in acquiring a license for the research.
James Opoakpajor from Ghana also showcased two organic products: a liquid fertiliser he produced using fish and a body ointment from molingah.
At his exhibition stand at the youth summit, he explained, “One kilogram of fish is enough to produce organic fertiliser for one acre of land.”
In an interview with him ahead of the summit, he cited an example of how urine from rabbits is used in producing organic fertiliser, stating that “Those who used this fertiliser during the dry spells experienced in Ghana recently didn’t suffer crop loss”.
He further explained how inorganic fertilisers make the soil compact, preventing water penetration into the soil and easy evaporation, hence crops susceptibility to dry spells.
Another organic fertiliser he has produced uses black soldier fly. That fly helps decompose organic waste and produces a larva after the decomposition. The droppings of the larva, known as “frass”, is a fertilizer and the larva itself, when milled, serve as a protein source in feeding fish.
Realising the benefits of agroecology and how the practice addresses climate issues, James Opoakpajor has established a youth centre, Opoakpajor Youth and Development Centre, in Techiman in the Bono East region, where the youth are educated on climate change and agricultural practices and crops that are resilient against climate change.
Mmakwena Moesi from Botswana, a co-founder of Viva Organica, a biotech company that produces organic fertiliser, said the company leverages on “using a circular economy approach and a type of earthworm called red wigglers that breaks down organic waste that we collect from retail stores and farms… to produce vermicompost”.
She, unlike Frank Kisamo, secured start-up funding from the Botswana Ministry of Youth in 2019, now the Ministry of Entrepreneurship, and later got some grant to expand, which led her to get to lease some farmland and a building.
Mmakwena said they initially sold directly to farmers to assist them, until the product recently got into retail stores “after we finished our regulatory compliance work”.
Viva Organica, she explained, also supplies organic seeds, and “we are expanding our portfolio into biopesticides and…“. The seeds she supplies, she indicated, are open pollinated ones, to give farmers the freedom to have returns on their investment with their seeds.
She narrated how she conceptualised the business as a solution to two issues: diverting waste that would’ve gone to landfills to cause environmental problems and remediating it in an environmentally friendly way into bio-fertiliser.
Producing about 48 tons of bio-fertiliser per annum, Mmakwena said her objective at Viva Organica is to find an integrated approach to growing food and provide alternatives to inorganic agricultural inputs that introduce invasive pests and diseases due to climate change.
As a biotech company, Viva Organica, she said, will soon introduce bio-pesticides into the market after research with an accredited university is completed. The product will target specific pests in order not to kill useful pests that enhance biodiversity.
The three people, Frank Kisamo, James Opoakpajor, and Mmakwena Moesi, are just a few of the young trailblazers who are providing alternatives to inorganic agro-inputs to promote food security in Africa and also address climate change.
