Day: May 31, 2024

It’s a sigh of relief for more than 30,000 Laikipia North residents following the launch of a Sh63.5 million dam in Doldol that is expected to address water crises in pastoral areas.

The 100,000-cubic-meter-capacity dam funded by the Ewaso Ng’iro North Development Authority (ENNDA) will provide water in the four communities of Ilgwesi, Ilmokodo, Ilmumonyot, Indikiriri, and Samburu County.

Doldol Dam Chairman Solomon Ole Pusi revealed that the dam, which was initially constructed by locals in the 1950s, had silted, but with the major boost from the government, water shortages will be a thing of the past for both people and wild animals.

”We are glad about the work being done here. With the enlargement of the dam and desilting, we hope that water challenges will be addressed. It’s sad that, even after the rainy season, we are left with no water for our livestock,’ said Ole Pusi, adding that during the drought season, they were forced to migrate to Mount Kenya forest in search of water for their livestock.

A
rea Member of Parliament Sarah Korere lauded the project, noting that pastoralists were severely affected by drought over the years and that water provision would be a game changer for the communities in her constituency.

According to ENNDA Director Corporate Services and Infrastructure Josiah Mulwa, the dam will be constructed within a period of six months, and it will be installed with a solar system for water pumping aimed at promoting green energy in the pastoral area.

‘This is a water-scarce area. Women, livestock, and children trek long distances to access water commodities, which is a major challenge. Upon completion of this project, many households will benefit,’ said Mulwa.

On his part, ENNDA Chairman Ahmed Duale said the construction of the dam would improve residents’ livelihoods and reiterated that the project will address the water shortage in the vast Laikipia North sub-county.

The chairman urged residents to support the project until its completion to ensure reliable water points for their
domestic usage.

Source: Kenya News Agency

Youth from Kericho County have been urged to actively participate in the budget-making process by submitting development projects.

The call was made during a sensitization forum in Kericho courtesy of the Emerging Leaders Foundation-Africa (ELF-Africa), revealing that in Kenya, approximately 75% of the population is under the age of 35 years, a demographic significantly affected by the budget-making process as it impacts key areas such as education, employment, healthcare, and social services, which are critical for their development and future opportunities.

While making her presentation, the ELF Africa budget facilitator, Diana Chepkorir, highlighted the critical role of public participation by the youth in fostering good governance, especially within Kenya’s decentralized government system, adding that transparency and social accountability will help the government spend on critical sectors that touch on the youth.

She said, their contribution can lead to more transparent and accountable governance, as
they are more likely to demand and ensure accountability. Policies crafted with youth input are more likely to address long-term challenges such as education, employment, and climate change, creating a sustainable future for all.

‘Young people bring innovative ideas and fresh approaches to addressing economic and social challenges, and that is another reason why we are championing for their participation in not only the budget-making process but also governance and policy issues,’ said Chepkorir.

Meanwhile, ELF Africa Governance and Civic Engagement Lead, Mr. Robert Mwangi, who spoke to KNA, said the workshop sought to empower young people, increasing their influence in developmental processes and enabling them to contribute meaningfully to governance.

‘We prioritize engagement and training by organizing youth-centered workshops to highlight how public participation is feasible at all levels, from the village to the county. The governments could provide training for youth on how to self-organize and turn t
heir ideas into actionable proposals’ said Mwangi.

The over 50 youth representatives present at the workshop were enlightened on a variety of issues, including early pregnancies across Kericho County, with an emphasis on the need for responsive budgeting to allocate resources towards education and health services to mitigate the challenge.

They were also sensitized on matters of climate change and how local policies can be adapted to address environmental sustainability and resilience, such as actively participating in frequent tree planting activities to increase the forest cover in the county.

The seminar was conducted at the ACK conference hall in Kericho town.

Source: Kenya News Agency

It is getting more difficult for farmers to adapt to climate change, and we need better-performing, more resilient agricultural technologies, African Development Bank Group President Dr. Akinwumi Adesina has said.

Dr. Adesina, who was speaking on the sidelines of the AFDB conference on leveraging the Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centre’s (CGIAR) technologies for Agricultural Transformation in Africa, noted that the capacity to adapt to climate change means that we have to continue to fund R and D.

‘There is no part of the world that has been able to achieve significant productivity growth and also transform agriculture without using CGIAR planting materials (Germplasm) technologies, which is very important,’ he said.

Dr. Adesina emphasized on the need to take the technologies that we have to the farmers. ‘What use are technologies that sit on the shelf? We need to do top-notch research and translate the R and D into real technologies that are adaptive, accessible, and highly productiv
e to allow smallholder farmers to raise their productivity.’

Countries, he noted, have to make sure that the CGIAR works very closely with national and regional agricultural research centers and also works very closely with the private sector to deliver results at scale.

Dr. Adesina applauded the CGIAR work on the technologies for African agricultural transformation, saying that the phenomenal work is an architecture that builds together the R and D system globally, nationally, and in the private sector and puts the best-performing technology in the hands of farmers.

He mentioned the technologies in maize, wheat growing in heat-tolerant varieties, and rice varieties that are being grown in low-land areas that have triple productivity, and this shows that Africa has the technology to feed itself.

Dr. Adesina, however, said that with all the technology, political will is a must. ‘Everything we do, we cannot succeed unless you have political support. The Green Revolution in Asia happened because of political
support. Our issue is political support and platform policy support to scale it, and that is exactly the same thing they did in Asia,’ he added.

He noted that Africa today has the Food and Agricultural Delivery Compact in 43 countries, where the work of CGIAR is ongoing with national and regional R and D systems that can feed into these particular platforms where there is policy support.

When it comes to agricultural feeding, Dr. Adesina said Africa should never be begging for food. Considering 65 per cent of the uncultivated arable land in the world is in Africa, ‘What Africa does with that agricultural budget is going to be the future of food in the world,’ he emphasized.

Going forward, the President said there will be a need to have a structural transformation of the labor composition of the agricultural sector because a lot of the farmers that we are supporting today with all these technologies have to change.

‘People are using drones. They are using automation; they are using all manner of big data a
nalytics to look into weather patterns, predict them, and get them to the hands of farmers,’ Dr. Adesina said.

Dr. Adesina said that at the African Development Bank, they have a programme called ‘Enable Youth in Agriculture,’ where they have already put in USD 490 million to support over 43,000 young people in agriculture, creating more than 63,000 jobs.

Chair CGIAR Dr. Lindiwe Sibanda said the programme cannot scale up without partners who know how to take the technologies from the shelf to the people who need them the most, and that is farmers.

She noted that CGIAR had neglected the grandmother, orphan, and women crops but now has embraced the Vision for Adapted Crops and Soils (VACS) programme that will be implemented mainly in Africa, looking at what we now call opportunity crops.

‘Most of those grandmother crops are what hold the answer for nutrition density and climate resilience. We are not afraid of the challenge of feeding 2.5 billion people by 2050 because we have the tools,’ she said.

Dr. Siba
nda explained that what Africa needs to do is make sure we deliver them in a climate-smart manner, but also go back to the gene banks to make sure what we thought had no commercial value now delivers food that makes sure we are nutritionally fed, but more importantly, we eradicate hunger.

During the meeting, Technology for African Agricultural Transformation (TAAT), a programme that increased agricultural productivity in Africa by deploying proven high-performance agricultural technologies currently in over 45 countries, including Kenya, was praised for raising food productivity in Africa.

Agriculture remains a cornerstone of Africa’s economy, providing livelihoods for most of the population and serving as a critical sector for economic growth and food security.

Source: Kenya News Agency