AGRO-WASTES TO AGRO-INPUTS INNOVATIONS

We are solving the problems of food insecurity and essential nutrients deficiencies due to poor Agricultural productivity and the use of chemical fertilizers  by few farmers at some points with the aim of improving Agricultural outputs.

Sierra Leone is by 70% farmers of it's human population, but yet still it is food insecured and 98% of rice, the staple food of the country is imported into the country.

99% of the farmers in the country are poor and are only subsistence farmers who hardly afford to buy chemicals and modern Agricultural equipment for effective farming. Moreover, extension services and research activities by the government to design and introduce cost effective and easily adopted and adapted farming innovations and technologies are highly ineffective.

The disposal of Agricultural wastes, such as husks from cereals and other crops, animal blood and dungs, wood chips, saw dust, crop residues and many more openly in the  environment is a common practice. This is due to the facts that there are no Industries in the country that are involved in using these wastes as raw materials, and the farmers have little or no ideas of turning them into useful AGRO-INPUTS for their own uses.

Our solutions are to innovatively and technologically converts Agricultural wastes into Biofertilizers and Soil Conditioners.

We produce CRH (Carbonized Rich Husk) from fresh rice husk, Biochar from wood chips, produce both solid and liquid Compostes from crop residues and animal wastes, organize vulnerable farmers into farmer groups and train them on the use of the products and also how to produce these products by themselves.

Our solutions worked well as boosters of Agricultural productivity, reduced threat to biodiversity, promoted organic farming and environment protection against Agricultural air, water and land pollutions.

Our direct beneficiaries are the vulnerable farmers, who are mostly women and youths and their immediately families.

This category of Sierra Leoneans make up the bulk of the population. They are players of pivotal roles in the food security drive of the country. However, these farmers are left to battle with the difficulties involved in profitable Agricultural engagement. No results oriented extension services and no committed innovators before this time to think of innovatively coming to their rescue.

Our team is in better position to design and deliver these solutions because it is our idea and we have done a lot of researches on the suitability, affordability and friendliness to the users and the CLIMATE. Moreover, we are in strong collaborations with the Agriculture committees of our host city and district councils, the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, the Environment Protection Agency and the Agri-Business Centres in our pilot district. With these structures, we are able to collect a concise data on all Farmer Based Organizations in the district and conducted full survey on their farming constraints, felt needs and the impacts of their activities on the CLIMATE and BIODIVERSITY. It was out of our survey we were able to discover that there are Agricultural wastes from various mills, there are pervasive shifting cultivation in the search of naturally fertile lands, there are some forms of chemical fertilizer use and many more.

We have shared responsibilities with our target farming communities on the design and implementation of our solutions. This is because our main goal is to let the farmers gain the technicalities involved in the design and implementation of the solutions so that they can be able to adopt and practice them in our absence.

We are applying to seek opportunities for financial and more Technical Supports in order to scale up our solution to reach out to the numerous potential beneficiaries of our solution in Sierra Leone.

Before this time, when Sierra Leone's population was low, there were adequate lands in  rural, urban and peri-urban areas for Agricultural activities like crop production. So those times the best alternatives to the use of chemical fertilizers were bush fallowing and shifting cultivation. However, these are no longer an effective alternatives, due to rapid increase in the country's population which has resulted to drastic expansion of communities on potential Agricultural lands. In addition to communities expansion, mining activities had left most communities with very little land space for Agricultural activities. These had left those people who depend on Agriculture for livelihood with no options order than continuous cultivation of small piece of land available to them and the use of chemical fertilizers at some points in order to boost crop yield, regardless of the numerous negative impacts on the environment and biodiversity.

Our solution of researching, producing and popularizing the use of Biofertilizers as opposed to the use of chemical fertilizers is an improved approach to the problems of environmental degradation, ground water poisoning, climate change, food poisoning, and many more problems associated with the use of chemical fertilizers.

This solution will catalyze crop production and food security in Sierra Leone as it is an easily adoptable and adaptable Technology with abundance of raw materials to practice at all costs, levels and localities. With or without formal education, the target beneficiaries would be able to grab the concept very fast and implement at their levels.

When this solution is scaled up, it will take over the fertilizer market in Sierra Leone as 90% of the farmers are poor and illiterate and thus want technologies that are inexpensive and require little or no formal education in order to utilize.

Our impact goal for the next year is to have the solution piloted in many locations in Sierra Leone, identify more potential beneficiaries and raised there awareness with regards to our solution.

In the next five years, our impact goal is to have the solution certified for use by farmers and a nation wide adoption of the solution.

We will ensure these impact goals by intensifying trials of the solution on Farmers' fields to ascertain it's suitability in terms of crop yield maximization, environmental friendliness and the likes. And do extensive collaborations with research institutions, government and non-governmental organizations at home and abroad for the release of the solution to the target beneficiaries.

We have numerous indicators to determine the progress of our solution. These include the number of farmers expressing interest for them to be part of the pilot phase of the solution, changes in the mindsets of farmers towards Agricultural wastes, rapid improvement in crop yield of farmers already benefiting the pilot solution and Farmers' return to previously marginalized and abandoned lands in our piloted communities.

We expect our solution to have an impact on the problem because it is the most ideal and internationally recommended alternative to the use of chemical fertilizers. This is so because of it diverse health, biodiversity, environmental, climate and nutritional benefits as compared to the use of synthetic fertilizers. It has very high potential for community adoption and a national coverage of potential beneficiaries. It involves easy technologies that can be easily learned by all categories of farmers. Abundance of raw materials for the solution and the ever increasing demand for food are assurances for the sustainable need of the solution.

Our solution is based on the use of various technologies to scientifically research and produce a product. It is mainly producing and releasing consumable product to Target beneficiaries.

Our organization has a created Constitution in which we have clearly stated goal, objectives, mission and vision statements, core values and rules that govern the rights of our members, the rights of our target communities and their inhabitants and the execution of our mandates.

We have zero tolerance against all forms of human rights abuses, marginalization and gender related issues.

Our organization was formed on democratic principles and is progressing on such principles.

The design of our organization is for both profits and non-profits making. We are a Farmer Based Organization (FBO). Which means we are involved in some forms of Agricultural productions. We make sales from our demonstration farms, consultancy services and the sales of quality seeds and seedlings to colleague farmers on cost recovery bases.

On the non-profit making aspect, we seek for fund for farmer capacity building trainings, we conduct research and share the results with farmers on free bases, we provide Technical Advices (TA) for especially resource poor farmers, we organize awareness raising campaigns against bad farming practices such as slash and burn, unrecommended use of agro-chemicals with negative impacts on the environment, we conduct market research and inform our colleague farmers on the outcome of such research, and many more non-profit making services.

Our plans for becoming financially sustainable include sales of proceeds from our demonstration farms, provision of Agrobased consultancy services, donations from donors and grants. 

In 2020, our organization won the Parmerculture Magazine runners' off prize of £ 2,500 and the only winner from Africa with the best Biodiversity Regeneration design  and community awareness raising campaign Programme on climate change.

In 2019, our team leader, Mr. Abu Gborie emerged as one of the 20 best innovators in Kono District, with a prize of Euro 6,000 from GIZ, with an innovative ideas to enhance youth employment and poverty reduction in Sierra Leone.