One of the joys of working in Malawi is the way that people share ideas and information very freely. Nobody is precious, and we are all keen to see the country develop, so any new developments are freely shared. We are always trying new things and over the last few days we have met with others who are also trying out new concepts.
Our friends at Tiyeni https://www.tiyeni.org/ have just taken delivery of an electric walking tractor which they are going to be testing with the many farmers’ groups with whom they work. We were out in the fields today and the temperature was 35 degrees, yet we saw many people hacking at the hard ground with their hand hoes. People need mechanisation to reduce the hard manual labour and to enable them to farm larger areas of ground. A tractor running on batteries charged from solar panels would be a huge boon, and we will be watching and learning as Tiyeni take this forward.
The second interesting project is being tested by the Soils, Food and Heathy Communities Organization, near Ekwendeni (SFHCO). They are doing excellent work supporting small scale farmers to make and use more compost, and reduce their dependence on expensive and harmful chemical fertilisers.
SFHCO are running an experiment to produce black soldier fly larvae. These bugs are full of great protein and make excellent fish or chicken feed and, in the right conditions, thousands of larvae can be produced using only waste food products. Apologies for the poor photos in the low lighting, but we saw the flies in the net breeding and laying eggs; the eggs being hatched; and then the larvae feeding and growing into plump pupae. Some people say that eating insects is the answer for feeding the growing population in our world – I much prefer the idea that the insects feed the chickens and then I get my protein that way! Each to his or her own though…
All in all, this is another project we will be keeping an eye on to see what the potential is for Malawi and for our new chicken hatchery business.
And finally, our own test project: we’ve been trialling blueberries and, having carried out extensive testing myself, I can confirm that the results are delicious! Mzuzu is 4,500 feet above sea level and so blueberry growing is feasible here, and we brought some bushes from South Africa to try them. So far, it looks like an excellent addition to our product list.
Malawi Fruits 