No-till Organic Farming for Youth Employment in The Gambia

The Gambia among the smallest and poorest countries, with a population of 1.8 million has agriculture with the highest potentials for employment. However, it fails to attract youth rather they prefer to embark on the deathly illegal migration through Mediterranean Sea to Europe this is because of its low-profitability, low-productivity and high labor intensiveness nature. 

Undergone a training with McCain Institute in USA on Agriculture, I realized that No-till-organic farming will provide solutions to attract youth into agriculture for employment, economic development and food security. It requires less labor, less capital, and more productive and profitable. This project will also train women on simple technologies to avoid post-harvest losses using simple affordable technologies. 

It will establish a No-till-organic farm academy that will be a training and demonstration center and will host, train, motivate and support youth farmers, discouraging them from illegal migration for greener pasture. 

The Gambia, among most African countries are affected by high rates of unemployment, poverty and high dependency.  This leaves young people without options to succeed, forcing many to travel illegally by land and through the Mediterranean Sea to Europe while others are engaged in illegal activities like robbing, drug dealing, street fighting etc. Young people with incredible potential have nowhere to go, and failed to see options for development in their countries. 

Illegal-migration is affecting both developed and developing countries. Africa is losing their potential future leaders to developed countries, Libyan war, and in the Mediterranean Sea while developed countries are experiencing an increase in unemployment, cost of asylum seekers care, illegal border crossing, crime rates and cost of rescue missions in sea. The problem of illegal migration is almost affecting the entire World while unemployment, high-dependency ratio and food-insecurity is affecting developing countries.  

This project will establish a sustainable no-till-organic farm to train and support youth. The farm will produce and sell to generate income for self-sustenance while acting as a demonstration and training center for next-generation of farmers for employment opportunities, economic development and food security, and discourage them from illegal-migration.

As the National Youth Coordinator for the National Coordinating Organization for Farmers Associations The Gambia (NACOFAG), I work in service of farmers especially youth farmers. My role is to implement youth related programs and projects to motivate and support them to take part in agriculture for employment, economic development and food insecurity. I also innovate, lobby and advocate for their support and development in the sector.

NACOFAG is the national networking organization for all farmers and farmers’ associations in The Gambia, in my capacity as the National Youth Coordinator work directly with youth farmers on farm support programs, business planning, training and networking them for support while I am also a farmer.

Establishing a strong communication link between my office and youth farmers, I am able to identify issues demotivating youths from engaging in agriculture which includes; high labor intensive, low profitability and low productivity. Introducing no-till-organic farming will reduce labor intensiveness and labor cost making farming more productive and profitable, moreover it produces better and healthier produce. This farm academy will train, motivate and support youth and women farmers into the sector. 

The project will support a planned business model by establishing a no-till-organic farm with small ruminants and poultries that will train, motivate and support next generation of farmers on affordable farming, storage and preservation. 

No-Till-Organic Farming:

This concept farming is yet to be introduced in The Gambia and many countries. It is more productive, environmentally friendly and climate-smart, requires less capital to start, healthier produce, less labor intensive and support soil microbial.

Start by mowing-down weeds to the ground and add a thick layer of well-rotted organic matter. This will suppress the growth of the weeds beneath by blocking out light and provide nutrient-rich material for roots to grow into. Trusted compost or manure used. Giving it time, the grasses and weeds below will rot-down and microbial activated then plant seedling.

Post-Harvest Loss Prevention:

The perishable nature of vegetable crops, force women are to sell their produce at a low price to avoid post-harvest losses. This discourages many people and also makes the sector unprofitable for youths.

- Solar drying of fresh fruits and vegetables is a simple processing technique that adds value to crop surpluses, preserves and extends food supplies, empowers smallholders and creates rural employment.  It is cost effective, beneficiary and dries twice or three times faster.  It uses simple and cheap materials.

Charcoal Storage Room- The construction of a cool room by using charcoal and watering the charcoal. It can keep produces cold for over 72 hours before adding water again. Two walls of wires are build fitted with charcoal in between them. 

 - Brick Preservation: This uses two walls of red bricks and in between a space of 5 to 6 inches, then filled with sand with a drip of water, this water is to maintain the coolness of the walls that coolness absorbed during the nights will keep the room cool for crop storage.

A coolbot will also be introduced. 

This project aims at increasing youth participation in the agricultural value chain for employment, economic independence, and food security through the farm academy. It will increase the awareness of youths on the opportunities, provide training, establish a mini farm academy. It will also seek to develop better market systems such as market information sharing, entrepreneur skills, internet shopping among others. In this process, the project will conduct radio and TV talk shows, media sensitization and awareness campaigns, farmer to farmer field visits, farmers’ etc.

The Gambia have been implementing agricultural projects that are mostly not sustainable after phasing out. I can attribute this to our vision on agricultural mechanization as the most ideal solution to increase and improve production whiles not considering cost of equipment, operations and maintenance that farmers cannot afford. I realized an ideal solution when I met farmers who were peace corps in The Gambia and now doing no-till organic farming based on their farming experience from The Gambia that they are advancing.

Now I hope to establish the first-ever no-till organic farm academy, that will train, support and motivate youth farmers into the agricultural value chain for employment opportunities, economic development and food security. It will be a demonstration and training center for next generation of farmers. No-till organic farming and farm academies are yet to introduced in the Gambia.  No-till organic farming is a system that avoids disturbing the soil with tools. it is less labor intensive, inexpensive to start and maintain, more productive and profitable, and produces healthier produces compare to other farming models. It will also introduce some simple affordable storage and preservation techniques using charcoal, solar drying chimney, red-brick cool room, and coolbot. These techniques are also yet to be introduced in the Gambia, they will support women to reduce post-harvest losses to increase profits.

This proposal is different from others, because it will be implemented in the first-ever farm academy in The Gambia, that introduce no-till farming to youths for employment opportunities, economic-development and food-security.

Organic no-till farming system is both a technique and a tool to achieve farmer’s objectives of reducing tillage and improving soil organic matter. It starts by mowing-down weeds to the ground and add a thick layer of well-rotted organic matter. This will suppress the growth of the weeds beneath by blocking out light and provide nutrient-rich material for roots to grow into. Add a trusted organic compost or manure to the soil. Giving it time, the grasses and weeds below will rot-down and microbial activated then plant seedling. In this technique seedlings are deposited into an untilled soil and allow to grow ahead of weeds and suppress them. It does minimal soil disturbance (no ploughing and harrowing) and it covers the soil permanent vegetation, that supports soil microbial activities. 

It is regarded as a component of sustainable land management and better land husbandry approaches that is climate smart.

Besides organic farming techniques, I will introduce post-harvest loss prevention techniques. They include;

- Solar drying by building a chimney that support drying faster than direct solar drying.

- Charcoal Storage Room- The construction of a cool room by using charcoal and watering the charcoal.

 - Brick Preservation: This uses two walls of red bricks and in between a space of 5 to 6 inches, then filled with sand with drips of water as a cold room.

- coolbot is a cool room build with insulating walls that have an air conditioner controlled by the coolboot device.

This project seeks to establish the first-ever no-till organic farm academy in The Gambia, that will train, support and motivate youth farmers into the agricultural value chain of The Gambia. It will act as a demonstration and training center for youth and women farmers while operating on a business model for sustainability. It will grow crops and breed livestock, sell and reinvest to supply food to the market through youth entrepreneurship and it will also host and pay interns for effective learning and support them to establish their own farms.

This project will establish a youth entrepreneurship farm that will expand through its reinvestment and support youth farmers to establish their own farms. It will also reduce illegal migration as youth will be employed throughout the value chain. The project will also train and organize youths through networking, this will result to a well-informed, productive and trained youth farmer.

The Gambia agricultural sector is not productive, almost 75% of the population are farmers, however over 80% of food consumed in the Gambia is imported. These statistics are a proof of how unproductive and profitable agriculture is in The Gambia.

We will use the following as measuring tools; The farm inventories, profits, assets and trainings to measure the academy’s performance; Annual reports on illegal migration by IOM on the Gambia; Number of trained and established youth farmers on records; Increased in the number of motivated youth farmers by surveys and Continuity of training activities for youth and women farmers.

As the National Youth Coordinator, I am working with 32 youths from 16 farmer federations, who are trained with farming models in a train the trainers' programs to support spread the information to other youth farmers nationwide. However, this might not be enough to help them establish their own farms due to scarcity of resources. The office of the National Youth Coordinator serves all youth farmers of the country. The establishment of this Farm academy will scale up to train and serve at least 100 youth farmers annually. This project will help train, motivate and support youth farmers to establish organic no-till farms for employment, food security and economic development through the application of technologies that are simple, affordable, productive and climate smart. In five years, we will train 500 youth farmers and support them to establish their own farms. The farm academy will host them as interns and train them on the farming strategies. 

The project will also train at least 200 youths annually especially women those working along the agricultural value chain on entrepreneurship, storage and preservation of farm produce.    

The main goal of the project is to establish the first ever organic no-till farm academy in The Gambia that will train, motivate and support youth farmers to take part in agricultural production (organic no-till) for employment, economic development and national food security. In The Gambia, youths are challenged by high rates of unemployment and economic instability which leads to high dependence ratio. They are not interested in agriculture as an option for employment, economic development and food security because of its high labor intensiveness, low productivity and low profitability nature, and it requires high capital to start in the Gambia, this leaves them with fewer options to succeed which forced some of them to venture into illegal activities and/or illegal migration.

Introducing no-till organic farm will help overcome all the challenges mentioned above, hence it will attract many youths to farming rather than embarking on the deathly illegal journey to Europe and/or engage in other illegal practices. This will help create millions of employment opportunities and support the world to overcome illegal migration. The model will not only be a solution for The Gambia but to the sub-Saharan Africa. 

In the plan to implement this leadership action plan for national development, the main constraint is funding. I have studied this concept and practices from farmers in USA and realized that it can be a breakthrough not only for The Gambia but Africa as a whole. Financially, I cannot to establish a farm academy that will support the establish of youth farmers for national development. 

Technically, I will be challenged with human resource because these ideologies of farm operations are not yet introduced in The Gambia as farming systems. So it will take me time before I train enough individuals to support in the farm to train others

Culturally farmers are accustomed to their old practices, which is very difficult to change their mindset. This warrants more to the establish of the farm as a training academy and allow them to compare the differences on the own. 

The financial barriers will be challenged by searching for initial findings for the startup of the farm academy, after this stage the farm will cultivate, harvest, sell and reinvest for sustainability while using part of the profits to train and support other youth farmers. It will also provide services on farmland demarcation, building of other technologies and trainings for revenue.

The farm as a demonstration center will help break cultural barriers. It will allow farmers to compare their investments, productions and profits with that of the farm. These will serve as the greatest lesson for the farmer, I am confident that the production and income different between the farm and other farmer will help encourage farmers to adopt the model of farming. Also, the cost of organic producers are higher than conventional plan and there is always a ready market for organic products. The marketing aspect of the farm will also help move farming from subsistence to business farming. 

I learned that practices in USA from farmers in California and University of California, Davis (UC Davis). This learned 

I will use resources to train other farmers to improve production and their income and I will use some of them as trainers. I have already acquired a piece of land, however it might be tiny for these operations. I hope to use this knowledge with farmers especially youth farmers for employment, economic development and food security. 

The National Coordinating Organization for Farmers Association The Gambia (NACOFAG) is the national networking body for all farmers, farmer associations and people along the agricultural value chain in The Gambia. It has a membership of 16 farmer federations and individuals along the agricultural value chain. It 

is recognized by the Gambia Government and its partners as the main farmers' representative in decision-making processes and lobbying for farmers development both nationally and internationally. 

The Youth College of the National Coordinating Organization for Farmers Association The Gambia (NACOFAG) headed by the National Youth Coordinator, implements youth related programs and projects for youth agricultural develop. Because of the lack of resources, the Youth College has 32 youths under his office to train, motivate and support to establish their own farmers for economic development and employment. The office is a branch of NACOFAG and reports directly to the National Coordinator and auditable by the Monitoring and Evaluation office.

The NACOFAG Youth College has 32 youths membership, these youths are part-time staffs to support the implementation of the project.  The project will employ two full-time experts for livestock and crop production. it will also invite short time trainers to conduct trainings on entrepreneurship development. 

I worked with farmers immediately after completing my High School education by mobilizing youths to form a small community based organization called the Shepherds and Livestock Owners Association to fight against the ever increasing livestock theft in the community. Due to the success of the organization, it expanded and increased its membership to district, regional and national level to form the National Livestock Owners Association of The Gambia in which I am the Secretary General. In 2015, I was appointed as the National Youth Coordinator of NACOFAG Youth College. 

During my service with the farmers, I attended The Gambia College to be trained as an Agricultural Teacher from 2008 to 2011. I used the knowledge gain from the college to train farmer especially youth farmer. 

In 2018, the McCain Institute for International Leadership in USA selected me to take part in a one-year leadership training program specialized in Agriculture. In this training, I focused on No-till Organic farming with some simple affordable techniques for farmers. 

The NACOFAG Youth College comprises youths who have a minimum of 5 years in agricultural production. These people will train farmers in the field on production headed by me.

The NACOFAG Youth College has two partners for initial piloting, they are the Department of Agriculture and Department of Livestock Services. This two department will directly support the implementation of the project by advising on effective organic no-till farming and organic livestock husbandry. They will share resources and communicate the concept to other stakeholder for a national conceptualization. The two departments will also support the establishment of new youth farmers. 

we will invite staffs from these departments to provide specific training for the farmers. The Department of Livestock Services, is the national veterinary service of the Gambia and is responsible for the overall welfare, production and productivity of livestock. They will be responsible to; Ensure herd health through disease surveillance, conduct of vaccination programs etc. Extension service delivery (outreach veterinary treatments and farmer trainings among others.

Department of Agricultural Services will support services on crop production, pest control and communicate concept to farmers by coordinating with the project. They will also do the following if need be: Pest Management and, Water and Soil Management advise. 

The no-till organic farm academy will operate as a business to serve the youths of the country. It will train and support youths in no-till organic farming for youth employment and economic development while growing crops, rearing livestock and sell them for reinvestment and sustainability of the program. The farm will create more employment opportunities by hosting interns, training them and support them to establish their own farms. This will reduce illegal migration and other youth related crimes within the communities and The Gambia. 

It will supply its produce to youths in the agricultural value chain to support them establish their own businesses in the agribusiness especially women. They will sell this produce within the community markets for food security. 

The farm will train, motivate and support youth farmers along the agricultural value chain and create employment opportunities, economic development to produce enough food supply to the population of the country. The main product is the concept of No-Till Organic farming practices with simple technologies that will attract youths into agricultural value chain by eliminating their challenges on its high labour intensiveness, low productive and low profitability, also supply the produce to others in the market to establish agribusinesses and food security.  

The initial funding for this project will be through grants because the people and Government might be hard to bring to support this project because the concept is yet to introduced in the country. so we seek to apply for grants to start the farm under the youth college. 

Once the farm academy is established, the financial sustainability plan through the production of crops and livestock which will be sold to the markets through the youths in the agribusiness and 

the proceeds will be reinvested. The academy will also provide services to other commercial farms and institution which will serve as a source of revenue. 

Therefore, the concept is to grow vegetable crops and breed livestock, sell and reinvest.

Solve can help overcome the financial challenges for the start of this project. We might need support to establish similar farms for youth throughout the country to train, motivate and support fellows for to take part in agriculture for employment, economic development and food security. 

If selected, the project will help me implement and fulfill my Leadership Action Plan to increase youth participation in agricultural development for employment, economic development and food security. This will give me a farm that I will be used to support youth of the country.

If selected, Solve will support me in meeting and connecting with investors to grow my exposure to enable support more youths in the international world. I will also seek to receive strategic advice and mentorship from individuals for effective implementation of idealogies. more I wish to join a class of peers in the arena. 

I would like to partner with many foundations to support and expand my idea throughout Africa among them is the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation, and Rockefeller foundation. I will also like to establish a strong relationship with Singing Frogs Farms, Sebastopol - California.  I will learn the funding and revenue, monitoring and Evaluation will be learned from Solve and its activities of measuring impact against input. 

The Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication of the Arizona State University is an ideal partner for media communication and speaking. 

The lack of communication between Gambian farmers, they don't have market information, the weather information and grown crops. The lack of this information leads farmers to overcrowd the market with the same crops which gives them lower prices because of supply while others will grow crops that will be destroyed by harsh weathers. 

The project will use a mobile phone information sharing strategy by collecting market information to farmers to avoid market losses through higher supplies of similar crops in the market at the same time to subscribers. It will also provide information to farmers about the number of crops especially vegetables at a time for them to do variable cropping. 

The project will create awareness and sensitization on the use of weather forecasting apps before growing crops to avoid seeds and seedling losses.