16 April 2025

16 April 2025 [Jemma] Already the Empowering the Future plot is growing produce. These sunflowers are being grown in order to press the seeds for oil. It’s the most delicious sunflower oil, grown with no inputs at all, and not refined or processed in any other way. It smells of sunflower. Here we have just down Kunde (Cow Pea) in between the rows of sunflower. This is a nitrogen fixer, will help to cover the soil, keep living roots in the soil and produce food in the form of the leaves even if they don’t produce peas (we're asking them to grow into the dry season). Win:win.

16 April 2025 [Jemma] If you haven’t seen them before, the little blobs on the roots of these karanga (peanut) plants are where the bacteria which fix nitrogen make their home. This nitrogen benefits other plants grown in the vicinity, hence the improved yields of both mahindi (maize) and karanga when they are intercropped.

15 April 2025 [Jemma] Our seminar in Miondo had to be rescheduled twice, but eventually on Saturday afternoon we were able to share knowledge about climate smart farming with about 20 people. They are keen that we return…

15 April 2025 [Jemma] In the face of an insufficient maize harvest, Empowering the Future offered people in Lamaiti vegetable seeds at quarter of their usual price. The hope is they will be able to eat some and also sell some in order to buy maize when they need it. Here is the little ‘shop’ where we packed down bulk bought seeds, and some customers. Hoping this may be the start of a community ‘seed club’.

5 April 2025 [Jemma] Just after dawn- my favourite Baobab tree on the corner of the Empowering plot, with our first crop - sunflowers, and a new stack of bricks ready for another layer of the building. We will plant Cow Pea between the sunflowers asap - they are nitrogen fixers, make nutritious beans and leaves

26 November 2024 [Jemma] Goats in Lamaiti with their kids

Updates from Empowering the Future

Updates from Dodoma, Tanzania