Tanzanian Salama Hussein Makame produces her own Bokashi and has increased her income sixfold.
Salama Hussein Makame is a farmer in Zanzibar, Tanzania, and has been cultivating fruits and vegetables for more than 30 years. She used to farm conventionally using chemical fertilisers and pesticides. However, at some point, she started to feel the negative effects of conventional farming. She had to spend more and more money on inputs, while at the same time the health of her soil was declining. Her former clients didn’t buy her produce anymore due to increased contamination. “I lost income and my family’s livelihood deteriorated”, she says. She then started to try organic farming practices.
In 2020, Salama Hussein Makame was identified as one of 360 multipliers in Tanzania by KCOA’s implementing partner organisation Tanzania Organic Agriculture Movement (TOAM). As a result, she participated in organic farming trainings organised by TOAM under the KCOA project and learned about plant and soil health, seeds, Participatory Guarantee Systems and marketing. Salama Hussein Makame is happy that she now has easy access to affordable inputs. In fact, she prepares Bokashi bio-fertiliser herself and uses it on her 0.5-acre vegetable plot. “I decided to use Bokashi because it is more effective than other bio-fertilisers and can be used after only 13 days”, she explains. Bokashi is a composting process where organic matter and food waste are fermented with the help of special bacteria before they can be applied directly to the field.
Thanks to using Bokashi and other organic practices, Salama Hussein Makame has increased her vegetable production by 650 kilograms. She sells her products to the village community and twice a month at Zanzibar Organic Open Market. Switching to organic does not only mean healthy and safe food, but has also paid off economically for Salama Hussein Makame, as she has been able to increase her monthly income from 86 to 515 US dollars. Her family and community members greatly appreciate the quality of the produce and have requested to learn how to make Bokashi.
Salama Hussein Makame believes that organic farming knowledge has the potential to transform and improve the livelihood of rural women in Zanzibar. As a multiplier, she is committed to contributing to this positive change by sharing her acquired knowledge with the other women in her community. She currently trains and accompanies 30 farmers in organic farming.
* This story was originally published on the KCOA Newsletter – Issue no. 6.
Editors/ Authors: KHSA and GIZ-KCOA, Photo: Anatory Gabriel
Author: Abdi Debel
• Managing the knowledge hub platform and providing training • Organizing conferences/online JF for KCOA and partner organization globally (with e-learning approaches) • Developing new manual for the digital knowledge platform (DKP) • Supporting the knowledge management team
