Paul and Rebecca Mosley in Ethiopia: How do you feed a family of 10 on tired soil?

Shanka, Abebech and Tilahun (TDA staff)

We met Shanka Sadamu and Abebech Adaane outside their tidy home, decorated with blue and white painted designs and an inscription, declaring that “Jesus is Lord” (in English). We were surprised to learn that this young-looking couple together the couple have 10 children: 6 boys and 4 girls. The eldest boy serves as a pilot in the Ethiopian Air Force, the eldest girl is married locally, but the other 8 kids are still at home with them. Our group of visiting NGO staff, government workers, and researchers sat under the shade of a mango tree while we heard the story of how this couple got involved in Conservation Agriculture and Sustainable Intensification (CASI).

Shanka showing a plowed field

Two years ago Terrapeza Development Association (TDA) started this project by selecting lead farmers and taking them to visit other farmers who had been engaged in sustainable agricultural intensification for a while. The new lead farmers were amazed. The yields they saw under CASI were so much higher. They came home and started urging Shanka and others to try it.

For many years, Shanka would plow his fields seven times before planting. He worked hard. But he could hardly manage to feed his large family one meal a day. With every heavy rain, the topsoil of his well-plowed fields would be washed away. He got disappointing yields every time. The approach the lead farmers suggested seemed like senseless idleness. How could one not plow? All they suggested was to stop plowing and add mulch along with the other agronomic practices. It didn’t make sense! But finally, Shanka and Abebech decided to try it out.

They had just been through a personal turning point. In the past, Shanka had a habit of leaving home and wandering to the market, looking for casual work, failing and just hanging out with friends. His wife would panic when he was gone, but there was nothing lucrative or interesting going on on his farm. So why stay around? Then he got into a motorcycle accident. God spared his life and he decided that he needed to change his ways.

Praising God for an answer to prayer

Shanka’s involvement in conservation agriculture began with a spiritual experience, an answer to prayer, as the TDA staff person Admasu came and even knelt with them to pray as they started this experiment. They started with just a small plot, 30m x 50 m. But that one field produced an incredible yield. It was a total paradigm shift, “Like a miracle.” They could see the change in the quality of their land, and saw the mulch “fattening the soil”; it even changed color in one season as the moisture and biomass increased. Admasu came back and saw the test plot and encouraged them to keep going, to try more.

Their neighbors thought they must have gone mad, watching the couple carry more mulching leaves up from the nearby river. They began to work together as a whole family. “CASI is a magnet,” said Shanka. “No more wandering, going to market. Now I stay home to work on my farm. And other farmers come here.”

Shanka

There were challenges. Mulch is scarce and there is competition to use it to feed livestock. But TDA came up with an answer: green manure cover crops. These are usually legume crops that are planted to improve soil quality and/or control weeds, the way that mulch does. Ideally, cover crops may also provide human food, animal forage, or other benefits. They can be annual plants or vines like haricot beans and cowpeas. They might also be bushes or trees like pigeon peas. Shanka and Abebech got seeds to try out GMCCs in their fields and are now experimenting with at least 3 different options.

They no longer have any worries about mulch material. The cover crops provide plenty of cover to suppress weeds, retain moisture, and add biomass gradually into the soil. In addition, these plants fix nitrogen in the soil. They provide the right environment for bacteria and other micro-organisms that need to be in the soil mix, enabling a productive grain harvest. Even the structure of the soil is positively impacted.

Corn stalks lined up as mulch

The change in the lives of Shanka and Abebech is remarkable. They were barely able to eat once a day in the past. Now they comfortably enjoy three meals a day. They work together and are both invested. They have tried lots of different crops with cover crops and have gotten great results. For example, from a plot 40m x 80m, Shanka harvested about 500 kg of maize using conventional agricultural methods in the past. Using CASI, he harvested 2000 kg from the same size field. That’s a 400% increase in yield: astounding!

Rich soil around mulched ginger

In 2012, a disease impacted the major cash crop of the region: ginger. It became a losing prospect to try to grow ginger in the past 10 years when 100 kg of seed only produced 150 kg of marketable ginger. But Shanka tried ginger with mulching and he was able to get a harvest of 800 kg. CASI methods helped the ginger to be resilient against disease. He made a profit of about $420 US (a large sum for an Ethiopian farmer) and bought an ox.

Different cover crops side by side

We took a tour of his fields and saw so many interesting innovations in place. He had just finished harvesting both maize and haricot beans from one field. The cut stalks of maize were lined up neatly, covering the entire field like a blanket of protection. The haricot beans were still drying and hadn’t yet been threshed but he was confident he would make a lot of money on that harvest. He plans to use the field next season for planting Taro, a local root crop that requires quite fertile soil. Another field was planted with cowpeas, a legume crop that was totally new to the community. But since there is a good market for it as a cash crop, people are planting it and enjoying the mulching and nitrogen-fixing benefits too. Shrubby pigeon peas lined the fields and paths, serving as a source of animal forage. Coffee trees full of cherries and banana groves shaded other fields where Taro was actively growing, demonstrating how various natural resources can be maintained together. Other fields were dedicated to growing animal fodder exclusively, to provide for the new ox. Shanka testified that even if the government told him that conservation agriculture was illegal, he would risk jail, even death, to keep doing it.

Banana with pigeon pea bushes on the right

Shanka and Abebech are trying everything, mulching everything, and getting great results. Other farmers are learning from them. They estimate that about 325 other farmers have started adopting these CASI practices, and the government extension officer Habakok Kikamo verified that this is true. In fact, for his job, he often has to travel between different communities. He loves to come to visit Shanka because he knows the family always has some food to spare for him.

Deresse Dana, 29, another
farmer trying CASI

Shanka and Abebech were just one family engaged in conservation agriculture in Adila Kebele, part of the Bolosso Bombe Woreda in the Wolayita Zone of the South Ethiopia Regional State. Terrapeza Development Association is part of a network of partners of the Canadian Food Grains Bank, and this Ethiopian network including several MCC partners has been doing a tremendous job of scaling up CASI all around the country. TDA is not a direct MCC partner, but is a sister organization, and hosted a national summit on green manure cover crops this past week. Gender balance is often a problem at these conferences of professional plant scientists, and for that reason, Paul said it was a good idea if I attended this event instead of him. I’m glad he suggested it! There were a few women farmers who attended the first day of the meeting, but I was one of only two women professional attendees out of 90 total.

MCC is a major supporter of this CFGB network, and so we were able to invite staff from four different partners to come and learn more and share experiences.

Abebech, Shanka, and two of their kids

We were joined by many well-known researchers in the field. It was quite a festive atmosphere as we met up with colleagues at the airport to fly down to Arba Minch. (Initially, we had intended to drive down south, but the security situation has gotten even worse these days with a kidnapping not far out of Addis). So, we flew down and then were driven 2 hours onwards to Wolayta Sodo through beautiful, lush countryside, dotted with lakes and fruit trees.

On Tuesday, we got an overview of the story of conservation agriculture in Ethiopia, as implemented by the CFGB network. A major science leader, Dr. Kindie, outlined the results of action research performed on CASI, trying to analyze which combination of agricultural practices produces the best results – not surprisingly, it all depends on the local context. The major practices of Conservation agriculture have proven very effective: low/zero tillage, mulching, and crop rotation. But two key problems have emerged.

Farmer demonstrating Taro

1. There is a lack of mulching material
2. Inorganic fertilizer is scarce and expensive

Many were surprised to hear that Dr. Kindie advocated for a half-half mix of fertilizer: organic (providing the necessary carbon biomass) and inorganic (providing essential minerals not found in most compost).

After a wonderful lunch provided by TDA, Neil Miller, our friend and ag expert, followed up with the answer to both those constraints to CASI: Green manure cover crops. We were able to meet with farmers who exhibited some marvelous produce grown with mulching. We looked at the seed options for cover crops. We smelled herbs and saw the pride of these farmers in what they could grow.

On Wednesday, we went to the field to different woredas in smaller groups to visit farmers like Shanka and Abebech. In fact, our group visited two more farmers and then ended up in the home compound of Gash Alemayehu Haliso.

Alemayehu in a field of cowpeas

His large family had prepared tables spread out under the shade of some very old mango and hardwood trees. They carried out to us enormous plates of local delicacies, root crops boiled and nicely prepared. We sampled white and purple yams, white sweet potatoes, boiled Taro and mashed Taro, and a heap of Bula, a sort of cheesy-tasting, tapioca-textured culinary mystery prepared from false banana. All of this was flavored by dipping pieces into very buttery pots of hot “data”—garlic, chili, and salt. We finished off the meal with bananas and coffee with butter (or without butter in my case – I wanted to sleep that night!).
data and a platter of roots and bula

Thursday involved a debrief of our various field visits and some other thoughtful presentations to complement what we had already seen. One woman gender officer shared the importance of involving women from the beginning of a project, consulting them about their needs and their schedule, and making sure they could access training, agricultural inputs, and the benefits of marketing their products. She also maintained that CASI really benefits women, reducing their workload, giving them more nutritious crops to feed their families, and allowing for more time for tasks of caring for children.

Habakok Kikamo, extension worker (blue)

It was very interesting to hear such support from the government delegation. Ten years ago, when this approach started, the Ministry of Agriculture was completely at odds with CASI and had no wish to support it. Agricultural policy at that time centered on pushing the use of inorganic fertilizer; conservation agriculture pushed just the opposite – GMCC’s. Now that fertilizer is very expensive or unavailable in Ethiopia, green manure cover crops look like a smart idea to everyone. Still, it seems best to use a combination of both at this point for the best yields.

Jakob (DF), Dr. Kindie (CYMMET), Frew,
myself and Mesfin on an evening walk

Along with learning a lot from more technical presentations and the field visit day, I really enjoyed being in the company of this group of agricultural experts. A network of development organizations has been working together consistently to promote Conservation Agriculture since 2015. They have developed strong collaboration – even warm friendship and trust – over these years. And I am sure that the quality of their dedication, working from the heart for the glory of God, really makes a difference in how they are able to be so effective. I really enjoyed having time for evening walks with some very high-powered scientists, and dinner discussion of the details of their field research.

Rebecca and Mesfin at the end of the conference

half a new wall

On Friday morning, we woke up early and made the journey back to Addis by bus and then by plane. Within hours, I was back into normal life, dealing with household issues and heading off to choir practice.

One amazing development I came home to was the impressive progress in the renovation of our hall bathroom. We picked a contractor who was ready to really get moving on the project. Day 1, Tuesday, he carefully removed the bathtub, saving the tile (construction materials cost about twice as much as it should because of the currency distortion).

full walls

On Day 2, he completely removed the wall between the bath and “Oren’s” bedroom, discovering that there was an additional hallway wall that was rotted and needed to be replaced. On Day 3, he built half the new wall of cinder blocks, and on Friday we watched him complete that new wall, along with the wall to enclose a shower box. Over the weekend, we had the task of “watering the walls” twice a day (in Amharic it sounds like giving the walls something to drink! Apparently that cures the cement somehow). It will be a big improvement to our guest bath facilities to have a shower option for them.

Work remained very busy for Paul and our other staff. There’s continued follow-up on our new vehicle purchase, but we won’t fully celebrate it until the car is parked in our compound. We’ve been working to complete our recruiting process for three Ethiopian young adult volunteers to serve with other international MCC programs. An intensive process of interviews and English tests absorbed the one week I was in the office between Djibouti and Sodo. We had a major team meeting that past Monday to review plans for completing our housekeeper’s condo. We were able to raise the needed funds, and Yeshi went with her contractor friend from church (donating his time) to go and buy all the necessary materials. Meanwhile, Paul has been working to develop contingency plans around the projects currently to be run in Amhara. Things continue to be very difficult in the Gojjam area, with a huge offensive from the federal military that started last weekend. There is little to no reporting on this conflict in local or international news. But we know that thousands have died and tens of thousands have been displaced. Farmers are not planting or harvesting, but bearing arms. The hunger crisis that resulted from the Tigray conflict two years ago remains a huge problem in northern Amhara.

Youth group spike ball and cross net

In other personal news, we hosted a fun youth group gathering last weekend. And then I had to preach the next morning. It was definitely a case of praying for sufficient grace to prepare and lead all the extra things after a busy work week, but grace was sufficient. And this weekend, David’s volleyball team played in an inter-school tournament. They have had some great coaching, quickly learning and growing in key skills. They also demonstrated such good attitudes and sportsmanship, caring for each other and not getting mad when kids made mistakes. And, as a good team, they actually won every single game they played yesterday, right up to winning the championship. We are really glad for David that he has enjoyed being part of a healthy, team-building athletic endeavor.

Bonus photos: