Machakos — For a couple that has weathered the dual tests of early retirement and repeated crop failures, it might have seemed an impossible dream to former primary-school teacher Philip Ngolania and his farmer wife that their three quarters of an acre farm could one day yield enough staple food to last an entire season.

But a visit to the local office of the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI) early this year ushered in a fresh beginning for the 62-year-old father of four grown sons, whose land barely produced enough food for the family’s daily meals in this drought-parched area east of the capital, Nairobi. Since that visit, he says, the family’s prospects have improved dramatically.

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Mumias Sugar has signed a soil fertility management programe with the Kenya Agriculture Research Institute (KARI) to address a cyclic cane shortage problem. Under the two year programe, KARI will research on soil conditions in the Mumias Sugar cane zones and advice on the suitable fertilizer.

Specifically, KARI will examine the physical and biological soil condition at Mumias growing scheme and then develop a cost effective fertilizer regime with a holistic crop nutrition strategy.

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Following a meeting in Japan between members of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, Mariam Mayet says there ‘is a huge disconnect between the rather timid, insipid and potentially dated work of the Protocol and the huge biosafety challenges presented on the domestic level in many countries’.

Ten years after the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (Biosafety Protocol) was adopted, the Parties to the Protocol met in Nagoya Japan between 11 – 15 October 2010 to adopt a new treaty, the ‘Nagoya – Kuala Lumpur Supplementary Protocol on Liability and Redress to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety’ (Supplementary Protocol).

This new treaty will need to be ratified by at least 40 parties to the Biosafety Protocol before it can come into effect. Its consequent implementation will take place within the overall framework of the Biosafety Protocol in an integrated manner.

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Tunisia continues to give a special interest to organic farming, promoting the sector thanks to the taking over the past 11 years of a number of key decisions.

In 1999, a technical center specializing in organic farming was created, to serve as a central mechanism and reference material.
In October 13, 2000 an awareness program on organic agriculture was developed to enhance the incentives and mechanisms set up in this sector.
A strategy of organic farming through the promotion of a sustainable program was set up in May 12, 2005. In 2006, a study was conducting aiming at identifying pilot areas specializing in organic farming.

In 2010, the maximum annual grant on the control and certification for producers members of development groups, cooperatives and professional groups increase from 5000 to reach 10,000 dinars per year.

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The Namibian Organic Association (NOA) has trained 22 farmers and 17 students of the Krumhuk Agricultural Training Centre on the use of effective micro-organisms (EM) in agriculture recently.

EM consists of mixed cultures of beneficial and naturally occurring micro-organisms that can be applied as inoculants to improve animal and crop production.

“The misuse and excessive use of chemical fertilisers and pesticides have often adversely affected the environment and created many food safety and quality and human and animal health problems,” the NOA says. “Consequently, there has been a growing interest in nature farming and organic agriculture by consumers and environmentalists as possible alternatives to chemical-based, conventional agriculture.

“EM use has developed over the last 20 years and is now used commercially in various fields,” says Manjo Smith, Chairperson of NOA.

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