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Camillians Training Farmers in Kenya’s Semi-arid Areas to Be "drivers of own development”

Building Community Resilience and Sustainability: Enhancing Food Security through Climate Smart Agriculture in Baringo County. Credit: CADIS

Members of the Order of Ministers of the Sick (Camillians), are training farmers in Sabalani area, one of the semi-arid parts of Kenya's Baringo County that is covered by the Catholic Diocese of Nakuru, to become “drivers of their own development”.

The people of the God in the area have been reached through an initiative dubbed, “Building Community Resilience and Sustainability: Enhancing Food Security through Climate Smart Agriculture in Baringo County”.

Spearheaded by the Camillian Disaster Service International (CADIS) Foundation, the humanitarian and development arm of the Italian-founded Religious Congregation, the project in the Kenyan Diocese aims as “empowering farmers to be drivers of their own development," CADIS officials say in a Monday, May 30 report

CADIS officials say the people of God in Salabani are highly dependent on rearing animals and subsistence agriculture that is sensitive to climate variations. 

The region experiences "chronic food insecurity and water scarcity," CADIS officials say, and highlight factors such poverty, natural resource-based conflicts, low human development and unfavorable climatic and weather conditions as responsible for the limited availability of food.

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Perennial droughts and floods are also to blame for the food insecurity, they say. 

In their May 30 report, CADIS officials say addressing the people's challenges is "crucial in the efforts to eradicate poverty and also build resilience to the locals affected by the flooding of Lake Baringo." 

To help build resilience, CADIS collaborated with the Baringo County Government in the training of 105 people from seven villages of the Salabani Community. 

Women, youth and men registered as Salabani Farmers' CBO "were trained and formed as part of the project with an aim of uplifting the lives of the residents of Salabani," CADIS officials say. 

They add, “Capacity building of farmers was conducted on Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA), climate change adaptation and mitigation, and soil, water, crop and livestock management."

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Apart from training farmers, officials of the development and humanitarian arm of the Camillians say their entity has facilitated the drilling of a borehole to help the local community with a supply of clean water. 

They add, "To overcome the issue of water supply for irrigation and domestic use, an underground water assessment was conducted by the experts and identified the appropriate position to drill a borehole. Water samples were submitted for testing to establish whether it was fit for irrigation and domestic consumption." 

Following the construction of the borehole, CADIS officials say in their May 30 report, "the locals are now having water for domestic, livestock and irrigation consumption."

Magdalene Kahiu is a Kenyan journalist with passion in Church communication. She holds a Degree in Social Communications from the Catholic University of Eastern Africa (CUEA). Currently, she works as a journalist for ACI Africa.