By Vision Reporter
Over the years, Uganda’s cattle corridor has been characterised by low productivity which, in the case of Nakasongola district, is made worse by frequent prolonged water shortage. Challenges of crop failure, hunger and inability to access gainful income has been reported among many households.
The biggest challenge for farmers, however, has been the unpredictability of weather, which was costing them a lot of produce.
Sylvia Nanyombi, of Lutengo village, Namungolo parish in Nakasongola district, said she almost gave up growing vegetables like onions, eggplants and tomatoes because the rains would never fall when expected.
“It was annoying listening to the weather forecasts for the day on radio. When we would expect sunshine, it would rain and vice versa. Accurate prediction of weather and getting good planting materials, especially for tomatoes, was difficult,” she said.
The innovation
To help farmers overcome the challenges, Makerere University, through its project “Transforming Water, Weather, and Climate information through In Situ observations for Geo-services in Africa (TWIGA), came up with a method of using mobile phone technology to monitor weather changes in order to correctly predict when to plant, weed and harvest.
Dr Eric Sande, the head of the Department of Zoology, Entomology and Fisheries Sciences at Makerere University, said the approach helps farmers to access weather information.
Sande explained that “the satellite sends data to the computer and avails actionable information to the national system” from which many farmers have benefited.
According to Sande, the sensor in automatic weather stations communicates weather parameters. He added that the technology, which is already being used, has helped farmers to be efficient and productive.
Nicholas Olango, an agricultural scientist, said the project intends to teach farmers to examine how new innovations can empower smallholder farmers, and the entire value chain that supports them, through the use of information and communications technology.
“Climate change presents complex challenges for farmers at all levels. Using technology to access information can help control some of the challenges,” he said.
Since 2017, Makerere University has innovated research to support knowledge and information through appropriate technologies in Nakasongola district.
“Through the Twiga project, the institution enhanced prediction of weather patterns by employing the use of Situ low-cost Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) sensors. The sensors are synergistically used with satellite-based sentinel Synthetic Aperture Radar SAR images and NWP models to monitor the spatial and temporal distribution of tropospheric water vapour,” Olango explained.
Twiga practices include training of local farmers on how much water can precipitate.
The results
Sande said since 2017, the project has enrolled 200 members from over six sub-counties in Nakasongola and that half are women. He added that all the 200 members were trained in agriculture technologies by specialists from Makerere University.
“All the trained farmers have smart phones which help them for weather forecasts. The grant recipients were given the task of first implementing the technologies within their households and, thereafter, using the lessons to mobilise other non-members to adopt the technologies,” Sande noted.
He added that this strategy would also help the project officers to easily track changes in household food harvests and incomes.
The majority of the farmers who participated in the training said they had benefited from the Twiga innovation.
Nanyombi said the technology has addressed some of the challenges that almost pushed her out of business.
David Sebirumbi, a resident of Namungolo village, said the technology helped him avoid the bad timing of planting the previous year which led to low harvest.
David Waliggo, a resident of Lwabiyata, praised the technology, saying his community was grateful and that there is no reason why they will not produce food.
Many households neighbouring the model farmers are copying their crop timing and also adopting the technologies as one of the ways to develop resilience against the weather vagaries presented by climate change.
Olango said he is confident the innovation will help the people in Nakasongola and, over time, all their neighbours.
The leaders called on the local communities to replicate such low-cost technologies as a strategy for ensuring food security among the households.
They also pledged to raise more awareness about the technologies and to strengthen support for local extension. The leaders promised to link the project beneficiaries with government programmes, such as Operation Wealth Creation (OWC) to leverage the efforts.
Mobile phone
Olango said the project intends to demonstrate to farmers how new innovations can empower smallholder farmers, and the entire value chain that supports them.
“Climate change presents complex challenges for farmers of all ages. The mobile phone technology now has more use than just chatting. It can access up-to-date weather information that helps to control bad weather timing,” he said.
Sarah Nakamya, the Nakasongola district production officer, said the Government identified the use of information and communications technology as a key strategy for spurring economic growth, improving the livelihood of citizens, efficiency and effectiveness of public service delivery.
She further said the agriculture sector deserves special emphasis because the majority of Ugandans are engaged in agriculture.
According to Olango, the productivity and yields of farmers who were associated with the project has greatly improved, compared to the non-targeted farmers.
He said this can already be seen by the farmers’ improved housing, nutrition and ability to take their children to better schools, including tertiary institutions in urban areas.
Citizen scientists
Sarah Nakamya said the district agricultural extension officers have also been retooled to be able to collect and analyse data from farmers and to give more useful feedback to the affected farmers.
“We trained and worked with them throughout the project implementation stage. We now have a critical mass of well-trained farmers whom we refer to as citizen scientists. They are able to identify common crop stresses which include pests and diseases, soil and environmental stresses and are able to apply mitigation measures,” she explained.
Nicholas Olango, an agricultural scientist, added that the citizen scientists are also now able to use digital technologies, especially smartphones, to get support in case they are faced with problems beyond their current knowledge and skills.
Alice Kaka, a resident, says the project was able to achieve sufficient amount of plant stress data using the photos and field information collected to develop software programmes that will be used to predict plant behaviour and expected yields based on the soil index and whether conditions
