Planting Scientific Ideas - and Harvesting More Food - in Kenya

By Karen Calabria
Special Correspondent

New York - Linnet Serenge Gohole, who grew up on a farm in the western Kenyan town of Kakamega, didn't always envision a career in agriculture. As a girl, she thought she'd like to be a dentist when she grew up.

"I spent all of my school holidays out in the fields planting and harvesting. My entire childhood was spent working on a farm. I wanted something [different]," she said. But when she failed to qualify for dental school - by a single point - she returned to what she knew best: farming.

"When I decided to study agriculture, I had no idea how much I'd enjoy working with farmers and the real joy I'd feel when what I've taught them makes a positive difference," Gohole said.

Gohole, 41, lectures agriculture students at Moi University in Eldoret, Kenya. Some of what she teaches them she learned as a recipient of a Norman E. Borlaug Fellowship, which brought her to Delaware State University in 2009. There, she underwent technical training in crop diversification. She learned to implement advances in biotechnology and molecular biology in crops native to her east African homeland. So far, she's achieved success with high-yielding strains of banana plants and drought-resistant varieties of sweet potato.

She hopes these advances will address the very real problems many Kenyan farmers face as a result of climate change: higher frequency of drought, creeping deserts and land degradation among them. "When I was young, families in my community produced enough food to feed their families. Now, with the population growing and outdated farming practices, it's not unusual to see homes where only one meal is served a day. And it's not a healthy meal, mostly cornmeal and greens - they're simply eating to fill their stomachs."

The repercussions go beyond food production. "You can't educate children who are hungry all the time. Health suffers, too, because people would rather spend money on food than on a trip to the hospital."

When she's not in the classroom, Gohole spends most of her time with small farmers in the communities surrounding Eldoret. "One of the areas of my research has been to look at ways to help small farmers eat better," she said. "We're trying to reintroduce indigenous crops, like yams and cassava. These are more suitable for the soil, don't have to be sprayed as much and have greater nutritional value than what farmers typically grow."
Despite their initial resistance to adopting new methods, farmers have slowly come around. Techniques like intercropping, the entwining of two crops on the same plot, have led to greater yields at harvest time. "Farmers can sell the surplus and add to their income." As a result, many have been more open to implementing new farming practices, such as diversifying crops and planting drought-resistant strains.

"Mostly, we're teaching small farmers to think of agriculture as an enterprise, not just a means of survival," Gohole said.

Source: U.S. Department of State