Madagascar

Project Journal by James B. Kennard
Last Updated: December 2, 2002

We've chosen Madagascar for a current project, and are establishing a training facility in the capitol city of Antananarivo. This wonderful country, off the Eastern coast of Africa, is one of the poorer countries in the world, yet the people are quite highly educated, intelligent, and hard working. Many years under French colonial rule, followed by 50 years under a corrupt socialist government have kept their economy from growing. In July a new government was recognized, which promises to bring freedom and opportunity at last.

Our goal is to introduce and promote scientific, sustainable, and environmentally friendly food production procedures that are designed specifically for small family farmers, and that can bring them out of poverty into self-sufficiency. The current crop of students will be leaders in bringing economic progress to their families and communities. I invite you to join me as we look in on some of these students and their personal lives.

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Visits to the women's gardens began with Mamitiana - a single girl of 29 who took us to her fiance's brother's home, where we helped her plant several short beds, mostly in tomatoes. She had them well prepared, and we had a fun hour with her and her family-to-be. This girl is a college graduate in agronomy, and does very well in the class. She could become a teacher of a future class if she wanted.

And by the way, everywhere I go I am accompanied by Manda, my translator, whom I greatly appreciate - both for her assistance in helping me communicate, and for her willingness to set everything else in her life aside to do this work for 12 + hours a day, 6 days a week. I'm recommending that the next instructor continue to use her.

Ravalamino (Mino) took us to her husband's family home, where we witnessed the heart-break of a prosperous family reduced to near penury by the African Swine disease and the loss of water in both their wells. These are wonderful, intelligent, educated, and hard-working people, and I am determined to help see them get back on their feet. The videos I have taken (samples of which I hope to have on the internet soon) give an idea of their multi-hectare homestead, and they are converting a sizeable part of it to the scientific methods Mino has learned. I have given them many flats of seedlings she helped grow, and fertilizers to get a good-sized garden started, and I want the Foundation to help them with a greenhouse right away, as well.

Lucie has a much smaller place. She and her husband and three children are just building a home, and their garden of 1/10th of an acre is adjacent to it. She was also well prepared for us, and since I visited her she has planted many more beds with seedlings we sent home with her. Interestingly, this family (also highly intelligent, etc., etc.) have rather sizeable deposits of Dolomite Lime and Iron on and adjacent to their property. I am having samples tested, and if they are rich enough, Lucie may be in the fertilizer business!

On the Southern hemisphere's May-Day (November 1) I visited Eulalie's family home, which is only about 10 miles from Tana as the crow flies, but due to some truly scary roads requires an hour and forty minutes to reach by four-wheel-drive truck. Something that to me is remarkable about these students is their willingness, and even eagerness, to take the time to assist their classmates in their gardens. On this day we had 6 other students go with us to help Eulalie and her brother in their garden, and three of them had already been there a few days previously, to help get some beds ready for us (and they had to push the truck in a rain and hail-storm at night over those same roads, just to get out - now that's scary!!). Eulalie's family home, first settled by her parents many years ago, includes a large area, and they employ and otherwise assist many people in the villages which surround their property. The farmable land consists of terraced hillsides and perhaps 30 hectares (75 acres) of valley-floor, which is typically put into wet-paddy rice. The spot chosen for the "New Method" was about a 2 kilometer walk from the family home-site (the actual home is gone - destroyed by a cyclone a few years ago). We planted 18 beds with seedlings, and prepared another 18 for later planting, and after 5 hours were ready to call it quits, but Eulalie had other plans.

She had us walk 2 ½ - 3 km up the mountainside to the Western edge of her property, where she showed us a large well and reservoir she has had built for the people of her village, to provide a clean, dependable water supply for the first time ever. The villagers are helping with some of the labor to pipe the water .9 KM from the well on the mountainside to the center of the village, and this promises to be a great blessing to about 1500 people. Eulalie also plans to demonstrate and eventually teach the scientific gardening to the villagers. This, I discovered that day, is a woman who lived comfortably in France for 20 years, most recently as a teacher, and just returned to her ancestral home two years ago in order to rescue the family property from neglect, squatters, and etc. She and her mentally-dependent brother also have adopted two young people, now about 21 years of age. I suspect the story behind all of that is also very interesting. Eulalie has not asked for assistance, but I am looking for ways to help her and her community.

The men's gardens are too numerous to enumerate each one, but a few stand out and deserve mention. Alain's family home is about 8 KM West/Northwest from Eulalie, but there is no road between them, so they are two hours distance by car - one of the main things that keeps Madagascar in poverty, in my opinion. Alain's family cultivates several hectares of land - also on hillsides - and they are doing an admirable job of growing onions in their narrow terraced beds! We planted a few beds with tomato seedlings using the scientific method, but I told Alain to just have his family begin using seedling production and proper natural mineral nutrients, and they would have fabulous yields, even planting in their existing beds. A seedling greenhouse is needed.

Naina, who speaks quite good English (with a German accent!), lives in Tana with his parents most of the time (as do many of the students) but his family farm is also a long drive on terrible roads. His brothers were tending the family gardens when we arrived, and we prepared and planted quite a few beds for them to see the difference scientific methods can make in their yield. Naina is now preparing a large area about .3 hectares distance from the family home, which he wants to farm using what he has learned. And he has been one of my best and most eager students, so I must do everything I can to help him succeed. While visiting him I discovered that his aunt and a cousin are teaching 73 village children, between the ages of 3 and 15, in a large room of their home - with no lights, heat, or water! And I saw almost nothing of books or other materials, only a couple of old, dingy blackboards. There must be a way to get some worthwhile teaching materials and books to these dedicated women!

Jose's family home is only a mile or so from the international airport, but terrible roads make it seem like the 19th century. Jose is also an excellent student, speaks English well, and helps quite often in the Project garden in translating for me or other students, if Manda is not handy. He has several small plots near the house that have trees and shrubs creating varying degrees of shade problems, which he is in the process of planting. In addition, they have about 3 hectares of rice-paddy land that we are figuring out the best way to convert to scientific production. A greenhouse would be such a blessing to these people!

One of the most amazing of all the students is Fidy. This young man, in his middle to late twenties, is so quiet you hardly know he is even there - but he drives a V.W. diesel(only about 5 people in the class have a motor vehicle of any kind), and has used it on many occasions to assist other students, and even to take Manda and me to their gardens on occasion. On Wednesday, October 30, I was scheduled to visit Fidy's garden, so after class we climbed into his V.W., along with two other students, and traveled about 13 km from the city center to work on his garden. Amazingly his one-hectare parcel of land is only a short 1 km off the good highway, on a fairly good dirt road, and sits about 30 feet above and right in the bend of a large, beautiful river, thus commanding a spectacular view of a man-made falls and beautiful gardens, mountains, and villages that surround him.

And what really thrilled me was to learn that Fidy purchased this property himself, with money he made raising and selling TOMATOES - and he did it more scientifically than anything else I have heard of here in Madagascar! Instead of the typical manure and a dose of NPK when plants are planted, which is typical, Fidy gave the plants Dolomite lime, boron, manure, and NPK before planting, and then followed it up with two later feedings of NPK. The lime to begin with, which has the very important calcium and magnesium nutrients, and two extra feedings undoubtedly made a great difference in his yield. He is a quiet but strong advocate of the methods we are teaching. And we created quite a stir in class the next day when I described everything I had seen and had Fidy explain in detail what he had done. It was worth more than a week of my teaching - for his classmates to discover that one of them had already been very successful as a grower by doing very similarly to what they were being taught to do.

Jeannot and Leonide are cousins, and after seeing their garden I dubbed them the "dark horses", because they have not made a ripple in class or garden, and yet their own garden, while smaller than some, was very impressive. Jeannot's father had only given them permission to do a small portion of his garden area using these methods, until they recently convinced him to come and see the Project. To their delight, upon returning home he announced that they were to re-do his entire garden area of about ½ hectare using the scientific methods, and he was very excited to have us there working on his garden that day. I am confident these young men will have good success - and their garden area is only about 50 yards from a busy road-side market area, which will greatly facilitate that part of the business!

Felix is another amazing person with quite a story. 15 years ago he was in the Malagasy military, a good boxer, and probably something of a "tough guy." He is still very fit physically, but now, I'm told he is the spiritual leader in his village. And in addition he is working hard to improve the village's economic condition by helping them learn and implement improved growing practices.

He owns about 5 hectares of land about 60 km West of Tana, and when we arrived we discovered many beds already carefully prepared and planted with tomato seedlings (which the Project had grown). While other students and some of his family members prepared and transplanted more beds, Felix and I measured, cleared, and staked the area he has chosen for his seedling greenhouse. He is determined to build a 20' X 40' greenhouse, just as we are using for the Training Project, and he was so excited to have my guidance and assistance in laying it out properly! I also noted the flimsy T-frames he was using, and we will provide proper T-frames, wire, and nylon string, so that his beautiful tomato plants don't all fall down as soon as they are heavy with fruit.

The area in which Felix lives has very few trees, and lumber will be expensive, so a properly constructed greenhouse will be difficult for him to achieve. I hope we can help make that a reality quickly, so that another village of several hundred good people can benefit. They are currently growing cucumbers on contract for Leco-Fruit, and paying exorbitant prices for manure, scrawny seedlings, fertilizers, and even transport of the crop. And the feeding program is primitive, as usual, guaranteeing a poor yield and continued economic servitude. I know Felix will help them do much better.

Jacques is the government Minister of Agriculture employee who was given a leave of absence to attend the training. He has been a very good student, and we have an excellent rapport. His interest is mainly in planting local items, to see how they do with these methods. He is so excited at the Manioc, Sweet Potato, Taro, and Tomato (!) seedlings we propagated, as well as rice seedlings grown in seedling flats (they usually grow them in "wet paddys").

On Saturday, November 9 we drove the 4-wheel-drive truck 2 ½ hours over some of the worst dirt roads I've seen yet, to deliver seedlings to his garden that is only 15 miles from a good paved road. Talk about having it hard! Their garden area is also a 30 minute walk from their home in a tiny village, and it is only accessible on foot, although we got within about 200 yards in the truck. We saw small sweet potato plants that have been in the ground for one year, a few of which have roots that are barely big enough to harvest. The sweet potato plants in the Project garden have been in the ground less than 2 months and are much bigger already than anything in Jacques' garden. He is thoroughly converted, and with the Foundation providing a few dollars' in natural mineral nutrients to assure his success, Jacques and his family and village will see vegetables like they have never experienced. He was also thrilled with the 2-way hoe I gave him, which worked great in weeding his wet paddy rice. These great people really deserve better conditions than they have had to endure.

Progress of the Garden

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