Tanzanian Harvest Increases Nine-fold

For many Tanzanian farmers, this year’s planting season—the first in a while with good rains—has produced a large harvest.

Steve Michmerhuizen, field staff member with the Christian Reformed World Relief Committee in Sengerema, Tanzania, was celebrating the success of a learning exchange program that helped local farmers learn from farmers in Zambia and see a 900 percent increase of crops on their land.

“Every year farmers pin their economies and livelihoods on the prospect of a good harvest,” Michmerhuizen explained. “But here in Tanzania, farmers believe that risk is lessened when they stick with what works. Basically, if a technique works, farmers don’t want to tamper with it.”

However, with rainfall being unpredictable, families growing larger, and soils being eroded or weakened, most farmers that work with CRWRC’s partner, Sengerema Informal Sector Association (SISA), are ready to try something new.

Still, introducing a new technique is always going to be met with a bit of skepticism.  That’s why CRWRC decided the best way to introduce a new technique to farmers was to skip the book learning and head straight to the field. 

Andrek Tembo, SISA staff, and Michmerhuizen took a number of Tanzanian farmers out to their fields and demonstrated conservation agriculture to them. Tembo went through the whole process step by step as he explained it to the Tanzanian farmers.  There was plenty of time for questions and comments as farmers dug holes and demonstrated the steps.  By the end of the morning, a good number of the farmers said they would give it a try on some of their land.

In fact, Michmerhuizen said, “by the beginning of the maize planting season, 379 farmers living in three different areas decided to try it out.”

Now, months later, the results are in.

“Joseph Shigulu, the Development Officer for SISA called me the other day with the harvest news," said Michmerhuizen.  “He said that farmers are reporting that where they once harvested only two 100 kilogram bags per acre (about four bushels), they were now harvesting 20 bags or 80 bushels.  That’s a 900 percent increase for the same piece of land.”