Two days in the life of a Suffolk farmer
This was an eventful and fruitful two days, which started early when I left my house in Senior Quarters, Gulu, for the 10 minute walk to meet colleagues who are travelling to the far north east, near the South Sudan border. The others are Phoebe, the head of our small team of volunteers and Salome, who has just joined the team.
They will be calling in at one of the schools I am working with in Pader, and I am catching a lift. I travel to my other schools on a cross-country motorbike, but this two and a half hour trip would be just too exhausting.
The hire car for this trip is an unknown quantity, so I am hoping the vehicle has decent suspension. There are 200 speed bumps in the first 30 km, and the next 100 km are murram – the red dirt road of Africa.
By 10am we are at the Alarm Technical and Peace-Building Centre, Pader, one of the 11 schools running our four month courses in agriculture for unemployed young people.
Uganda has the highest proportion of young people in the world, many of whom couldn’t afford to finish primary school. Most of them are children of subsistence farmers and, here in the north, their lives have been hugely disrupted by the 20 year conflict, that only subsided in 2008.
Farming is their only option, but normal practice is desperately inefficient. Among other problems, the widespread dry season burning of huge tracts of land – often for the sake of flushing out a few edible rats – is driving soil erosion and loss of soil fertility.
At Alarm, we tour the farm to see how much progress they have been able to make with the improvement plan I drew up after our discussions on my last two visits.
I am delighted to see that a barbed wire fence now closes off the whole area from the footpath to the village. This should prevent wandering livestock from eating plants in the nursery beds and risking infection to the piggery and chicken house.
They had had the automatic chicken drinker for a long time but, without instructions, were unable to get it working. Today it is working nicely. There are disinfectant footbaths at the entrance to the animal houses.
We spend some time discussing how to install nipple drinkers for the pigs, and where the pipework and header tanks should be. The shade house now has a new cover, with made up nursery beds ready for seeding with onion and cabbage. The rainy season has only just arrived, six weeks late, but there are tomato, aubergine, cabbage, and green pepper under grass thatched shades nearly ready for transplanting into the students’ own plots.
These are an innovation we have introduced which I hope will enable them to earn some cash and keep them motivated to attend.
After the others leave, Stephen, the principal, is called away to deal with a fire in the welding workshop (of which more later), and I can share a sociable breakfast cup of sweetened maize porridge with the farming instructors.
The rest of the day is spent on discussing possible sites where we could take students for ‘learning visits’, planning the detailed design of small drip irrigation plots and touring the other crop areas.
Alarm is part of an international African organisation and one of our best equipped partners. It often receives groups of visitors, and has an excellent guest house where I stay the night.
After breakfast of two hard boiled eggs and a banana, the principal gives me a lift on his elderly motorbike to the welding workshop in town. It is on the main street and they have a range of chairs, beds and window frames for sale.
The quality of the welding leaves much to be desired, which is not surprising given that they only have one stick welder which is only suitable for 2.5mm steel and thicker, and much of their work is with thin material right down to 0.8mm sheet. Safety standards are non-existent and would send a health and safety inspector into a decline.
However, huge improvements will be simple and need not cost a lot. I need to review with Dennis and Victor my outline improvement plan, part of which they can do themselves, and part will have to wait for the next round of grant applications. There is no safety cut-out on the electricity ‘system’, no plugs or sockets on anything, and all connections are made by twisting wires together. Junctions are left bare on the ground, and when it rains students get electric shocks through their flip-flops.
My farm workshop and building experience makes it straightforward to recommend the spec of the RCD cut-out needed, the size and type of cables and we agree on how long they need to be for each piece of equipment and where to put sockets. The RCD would probably have prevented the fire yesterday, which now necessitates the welder being transported to Gulu.
I have a 10am appointment with Arnold, 20 km away in Pajule, but the principal has disappeared in search of a printer with an electricity supply so I can take a document back to the VSO office for him.
Africa runs on Africa time, so Arnold is not at all surprised when I ring to say I will not be with him before 11am.
Eventually, the document arrives, and Victor finds me a boda-boda (motor-cycle taxi) for the ride to Pajule. It is the only way for me to get there, and I took the precaution of bringing my helmet. Helmets on bikes are still the exception, but VSO strictly insists that volunteers use them at all times.
At Pajule, I am meeting with Arnold, the manager of the Hub, a farmer training centre, where I have found out that they have a really good understanding of farming and the need to adapt new practices to adapt to the burgeoning population, and the effects of climate change and deforestation on rainfall patterns.
This makes the Hub a rare and extremely welcome find up here in the outposts of the north. I have decided that we need to run a training course on pest and disease management and use of knapsack sprayers for instructors in all our 11 schools, and my volunteer colleagues are also enthusiastic. Having seen my list of topics we should include, Arnold has agreed to run the course.
On arrival I find Arnold and his assistant examining maize seedlings infested with caterpillars. They have been scouting nearby farmers’ fields for the fall armyworm, a recent and potentially devastating pest in sub-Saharan Africa. This is a real plus as it’s the first time I have found anyone doing this sort of work.
After our meeting we nip into Pajule for lunch in a restaurant. I hoped to find a minibus taxi which would take me to back to Gulu, but they have all gone, so the only option is another 20km boda ride to Acholibor, where I can pick up a bus.
When the bus arrives, I squeeze myself and my rucksack and helmet into a seat beside Francis, a final year development studies student at Gulu University. He is convinced that the problem here is poverty, so I try to persuade him that while that is part of it, the main problem is lack of knowledge. At the front of the bus we share out biscuits, and I am informed that I am now an honorary Acholi, the local tribe.
The bus rattles and shakes over the 200 speed bumps, while the driver struggles with a clutch that is obviously on its last legs. At 5.30pm I am on the sofa with my wife Joan, and a cup of tea.
This has been a great couple of days, and I feel that we are really starting to have a useful effect in motivating, encouraging and informing our teaching partners so that they can change young people’s lives.
Soon my one year contract will be drawing to a close. It has been a huge challenge, and a steep learning curve, but I will miss chaotic Uganda, the red dirt roads, my motorbike, the warm welcome we have received and the friends we have made.