PROJECT
MULTI-YEAR PROJECT
Banana Value Chain Development Implementation
Funding: $400,000
Locations: Kirinyaga county in five sub-counties namely Kirinyaga East, Kirinyaga West, Mwea East, Mwea West, and Kirinyaga Central.
Duration: January 2013 – 2018
Project Objective:
The project’s overall objective was to enhance smallholder banana farmers’ incomes and livelihoods through linkage to sustainable markets such as high-end retail stores in Kenya and export markets where possible, with the envisioned outcome being an increase in the volumes of banana sales among the target County’s smallholder farmer beneficiaries.
The project’s key sub-objectives included:
- Building Farmer Organisations’ (FOs) technical capabilities to respond to market needs and demands.
- Strengthening FOs’ institutional capabilities for win-win partnerships.
The County Government of Kirinyaga was a key partner in the implementation of the project from its outset with NeoKenya and the Banana Growers Association of Kenya (BGAK) initially serving as partners to provide access to export markets for bananas and facilitate the process of organizing banana farmers respectively.
Accomplishments
- 1,500 farmers trained on improved banana productivity.
- A total of 16,250 plantlets had been sold through the nurseries as a result of EAMDA’s training on nursery sustainability model.
- A total of 11,357 farmers trained against a target of 11,000 in all the five Sub Counties of Kirinyaga County.
- Through partnership with service providers such as SoilCare and CropNut Kenya during the trainings, farmers purchased 50MTs of agricultural lime resulting in increased yields for over 300 farmers.
- A total of 20 demonstration plots established
- A total of 411 farmer organisations formed in improving yields resulting in total sales of 7,995 MTs.
- A total of 62 business forums
- A total of 54 collection centres against a target of 10 were set up enabling farmers’ sale of 7,995MTs of bananas against a target of 2,000MTs.
Project
Partners
