West Pokot and Turkan counties are among the counties in Kenya which experience extreme weather conditions with sweeping floods during the rainy season and ravaging drought in the dry season.
This has been causing dire food shortage among the communities living in the areas that have been classified as arid and semi-arid lands (ASAL). It is for this reason that there is a need for interventions with a climate-smart approach in food production to cushion the residents from hunger. Shirley Kigotho, 29, is one such agro-entrepreneur who has been championing resilient farming methods such as aquaponics and hydroponic among youth and women groups in the areas for food security.
She says she first got the concept of the alternative methods of farming sometime back while she was working for the Turkana county government as a financial analyst. She then embarked on online research on how developed countries are able to grow crops in arid and semi-arid areas using the aquaponics method which entails growing crops in a moist area by spraying plant roots with plant food nutrients and hydroponics using liquid, sand, gravel, and other materials to grow.
“After getting better information on the two methods of farming, I needed now to go practical to perfect the techniques,” said Shirley.
Read the entire article at Farmer's Review Africa