Blogs

In the era of climate change, relying on rain-fed agriculture has become unsustainable. Particularly in Kenya, rainy seasons which typically start from march through May and October through December, after which the weather becomes too dry to support growing crops, have become uncertain. When rains are scarce, farmers risk losing entire crops to drought.

A lagarta do funil do milho foi detectada em 2017, nas províncias de Tete (distrito de Changara e cidade de Tete), Manica (distritos de Chimoio, Vanduzi, Catandica e Manica) e Gaza (distritos de Bilene, Chicualacuala e Xai-Xai) em Moçambique. A Lagarta do funil de milho, Spodoptera frugiperda, é uma praga migratória e polífaga que ataca mais de 80 diferentes tipos de culturas, incluíndo o arroz, mapira, trigo e cana-sacarina, sendo o milho seu principal hospedeiro. E nos últimos anos tem assolado outras províncias do país.

PlantVillage, through the Dream Team Agro Consultancy Limited, is partnering with the County Government of Samburu under the Department of Livestock, Veterinary, and Fisheries to recruit 60 Community Disease Reporters (CDRs) to back up the organization’s efforts towards empowering pastoralist communities.

The CDRs will join the PlantVillage Scouts unit, which is tasked with reporting cases of animal disease outbreaks in rural areas to relevant officials from the Department of Livestock, Veterinary, and Fisheries, allowing for long-term efforts to mitigate the effects of climate change.

PlantVillage has been recognized as a top finalist in the recent Africa-Korea Agtech Innovation Challenge and Summit held in Nairobi, Kenya, on February 8^th  and 9^th  2023.

PlantVillage was among the 21 finalists who impressed with their disruptive technologies assisting farmers across the globe.Under the theme of improving agricultural productivity and efficiency, of note was our AI that farmers use to identify disease symptoms and pest damage on crops.

In early 2021, PlantVillage embarked on the cassava project in Kilifi County with the aim of scaling up production of the crop that has now been largely adopted in Bungoma and Busia counties.

The organization, through the Dream Team Agro Consultancy Limited, set up demo-plots, trained farmers, and distributed clean cuttings.

Farmers are now able to obtain clean cuttings from their own crops and ensure the continuity of the project, proving it more viable than before, when they used to make losses after planting using infected cuttings.

PlantVillage has partnered with Agricycle, a US-based organization, to get better prices for cassava farmers.

PlantVillage will now link small-scale cassava farmers in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania to an international market provided by Agricycle, which offers to buy the produce at Ksh65 per kilo, a 50 percent increase from the Ksh32 to Ksh38 offered by brokers.