Kill Bill

This is Bill holding a grasshopper at an agricultural demonstration site we've set up in Konia, the village where we mostly stay during field visits.

An overall objective of this project is to reduce deforestation and degradation of the Wonegizi forest area by offering farmers, engaged in much shifting cultivation (slash and burn), alternative methods of cultivation that should improve yields and incomes. Often these are known as 'farmer field schools'.

This plot is testing various approaches, such as velvet bean mulching to improve organic content of the soil and reduce nutrient run-off during heavy rains. A downside is increased weeding, but productivity should be higher. The experiments, if done with a degree of rigour, will show whether the farmers are getting more or better quality crops compared to conventional techniques.

Bill is an excellent intern focusing on 'integrated pest management', a concept of reducing losses of crops to pests, especially important with some of the conservation-friendly techniques we're piloting. We can't advocate bathing crops in damaging pesticides and it shouldn't be necessary in productive farming systems. Bill is looking at ways to kill pests organically and testing how this affects crop productivity.

Red cotton bugs were a strikingly pretty pest in the field today, but no friend of a farmer. After a tour of the demo site by Bill, we weeded the okra patch.