September 22, 2020

New ways of reaching farmers: Innovating to mitigate the effects of COVID-19 to smallholder farmers

Ethiopia

By 20th August 2020, Ethiopia had conducted a total of 694,093 COVID- 19 tests, and reported 35,836 confirmed cases. Out these 13,536 recovered and unfortunately, 620 lives have been lost as a result of the virus.

The Covid-19 pandemic has negatively impacted many business enterprises, education institutions, informal and subsistence businesses, and government agencies. Consequently, many people working in both formal and informal sectors (such as street vending, manufacturing, construction, agriculture, wholesale and retail trade) have been affected. These predicaments, no doubt, exacerbates the socioeconomic and food insecurity challenges in the country calling for wide-ranging through planning and proper management to nitigate the challenges.

Boka Tolossa is an employee in the government agriculture office of one small district named Terkanfeta Gibe Kebele in Tibet Woreda, Oromia region. "Coping with a new way for reaching small-holder farmers during COVID 19 pandemic" is how Boka Tolossa explained the present pandemic situation in relation to his day to day activity.

Boka has been included as one of the professionals implementing 2SCALE’s agronomical related activities targeting smallholder farmers. In the past, Boka like other 78 development agents received training on the maize extension organized by 2SCALE. Through the trained agents, it was possible to reach a total of 1,440 smallholder farmers. This year, due to the COVID 19 gathering restrictions, development agents were forced to innovate in order to continue with training activities. Unlike past years, this time they did so by visiting individual farmers' fields. In this way they were able to provide relevant information and follow up visits on maize extension to ensure farmers' productivity and awareness on maize agronomic practices.

As part of 2SCALE´s goal to reach out smallholder farmers, and following priority set by the business champion to source maize from these farmers, Bore Bako Cooperative Union is included as one main partner of the East African Tiger Brands Industry (EATBI) partnership. The 2SCALE partnership with EATBI aims to develop a nutritious consumer food product, especially focusing on malnutrition of children.

Aligning good agricultural practices with government’s measurements

During these COVID 19 challenging times, Boka has been giving agronomical related support to actors operating at Tetafeta Tube cluster. In the past, he could gather about 100 smallholder farmers in the same location and give training on the Maize extension package so as to improve farmers' knowledge on maize prior to planting season. But this year, things were different.

Boka explains:

Last year, in the month of May, I organized 3 training for Maize farmers in Woreda. On each training, I gathered 75 – 100 smallholder farmers . Yet, this year, I couldn’t organize any training sessions due to gathering restrictions imposed in response to fighting the pandemic. This tough challenge has forced the agriculture system to make tough decisions, and encouraged agronomy experts to provide support for farmers in any possible way.

To ensure that the program activities will continue to operate, 2SCALE team and training agents worked together to innovate possible ways to train smallholder farmers. Among the various ways to continue to support smallholder farmers and thus highly reduce the risk of exposure to COVID-19, small groups’ training and individual farmer field visits were conducted. Different digital communication platforms were also used, and as Boka mentioned, phone calls became the best communication channel, since they enabled making appointments prior to field visits, check on follow ups without traveling to fields, give advice and make timely decisions.

Training under COVID-19 restrictions

As part of his work duty, Boka has close contact and communication with farmers through different formal and informal platforms mainly to discuss agriculture related topics. The activity of giving training and information to individual farmers by visiting them on their farm fields has provided him with a good opportunity to discuss with smallholder farmers. Based on these practical experiences, Boka observed that individual farmers' meetings save time and energy, unlike attending training in a certain venue with big group gatherings. Furthermore, the activity of individual farmers' field visits helps to keep distancing between individuals, and thus highly reduces the risks of COVID-19 exposure.

During my field visit, I took enough time and attention for providing critical information and advice as the needed measures against the pandemic. I arrive at each visiting farm wearing properly the mask covering my nose and mouth, and start the conversation by greeting farmers without physical contact and keeping distance. I was also carrying sanitizer and using it to clean my hands regularly.

Boka adds.

The importance of continuity of ongoing training as part of the farmer's learning process are now more relevant than ever considering that agriculture (the mainstay of Ethiopia's economy) is one the key sectors that have been severely affected by COVID-19. Farmers utilize agriculture experts visiting time effectively in one to one communication. Individual farmers express their concerns and have discussions with visiting agriculture experts freely, without being dominated or intimidated by other farmers.

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