Description:
|
There are 25 students and 5 peer trainers on experimental plots high in the mountains, at the farmer’s field school in Nyange village, Ngororero. Farmers learn the value of applying Integrated Pest Management (IPM) to test varieties of maize crops. They have formed 5 groups of five students and each have two test plots where they have planted maize. On one plot the farmers sparingly apply fertilizer and pesticides (IPM), on the other, the farmers use ‘traditional methods’ of cultivation which consist of an ‘anything goes’ approach. Sylvestre Rwamahina, peer trainer, says “I have left the traditional method of farming for the more modern IPM method in my own farm work. I grow Irish potatoes, bananas and beans.”
|