Kenyans across the country are currently facing hunger due to the harsh effects of climate change even as the government struggles to intervene.
The situation is dire.
Despite all these, several players including county governments, NGOs both local and foreign, cooperate organizations, individual well–wishers, and leaders are doing everything to help save the situation.
Machakos which is listed among Arid and Semi–Arid areas isn’t exceptional.
Several residents have been hit hard by hunger due to the prolonged drought.
Despite the situation, residents of Muthetheni in Mwala, Machakos, have been privileged to have information that helps them prepare psychologically for the effects of climate change.
This is courtesy of the Kenya Climate Smart Agriculture Project, an NGO which has a presence in 24 counties.
KCSAP ICT specialist Irene Kimani said the organization helps the residents, especially small-scale farmers with digital farming advisories on weather to help them succeed in farming despite the effects of climate change.
“We have an App installed in residents’ smartphones that enables them to get information from us on the weather every three months. These advisories help farmers grow climate-smart crops,” Kimani said.
She said digital agriculture and dairy farming had to some extent enabled the farmers from Asal areas to adapt to the effects of climate change.
Those farmers who don’t have access to smartphones and internet receive such information on their phones as text messages.
The farmers have, however, noted that despite the fact that they were informed of such advisories, they were affected by hunger since all their crops had withered due to lack of rain and water for irrigation.
They don’t get good yields whether crops or livestock production.
The residents narrated their experiences when Global Center on Adaptation chief executive Patrick Verkooijen visited their farms on January 29.
“Climate change has seriously affected us, whenever we plant crops, they wither. We have nothing to feed ourselves alongside our children,” Eunice Mutungi said.
Mutungi said, though, the digital advisories had to some extent helped them become resilient to the effects of climate change lately, they needed water to beat the harsh weather pattern.
She said most of the residents survive on a meal a day as opposed to three meals due to hard economic times caused by drought.
“We have seasonal rivers and vast land for farming, but the problem is water. Water comes in seasons and it hasn’t rained for months now. We need boreholes and dams so that we irrigate our land for improved yields,” Mutungi said.
She said they walk two kilometres searching for water from the few community dams available in the locality where they are forced to spend more time queuing to collect the important but scarce commodity.
The residents said the advisory creates awareness, prepares farmers for the season and helps them plant crops and seeds that sustain that particular weather.
The KSAP project was launched in the village in 2020. Farmers have been put in groups to benefit from the program.
Several women who spoke to the Star said they had resolved to mixed farming including rearing livestock to support their families.
“An NGO supported us with chicken which I sold some time back to pay school fees after crops withered with no yields. Most women engage in menial jobs to fend for our families,” one of the women said.
Verkooijen said Africa and Kenya have choices to make as far as climate change is concerned.
“Climate change is still on the food of Africa’s table. That was precisely the message I received last Sunday when I was welcomed by smallholder farmers in Machakos,” Verkooijen said.
“The message was clear, recovering from Covid-19, and suffering from the consequences of the Ukraine war which led to the increase in food prices. Now, on top of that, we see the largest drought in 40 years in the Horn of Africa."
He spoke during a digital workshop attended by representatives from 13 African countries at Wangari Maathai Institute on Tuesday.
"Africa, the continent which contributes the least to the climate crisis, less than three per cent of green gas emissions come from Africa itself. But at the same time, it’s suffering from the brunt of the consequences,” Verkooijen said.
He said drought in the Horn of Africa flattens other parts, and 9 out of 10 most climate-vulnerable nations in the world are in Africa, Kenya being one of them.
“Africa and Kenya have choices to make. The choice is very simple, adapt or die. The world has promised to support the African continent with financial resources to support the Agriculture sector, infrastructure, youth and job employment creation to become climate resilient,” Verkooijen said.
He said Kenya needed an agricultural sector that was prone to address the shock of the day, and much more shocks of tomorrow.
“Technologies are here, the solutions are here. But, what they need is skills, speed or what they particularly need is one message from Machakos; water, water, water,” he said.
He said as Global Centre Adaptation, they can’t bring water from the West to Kenya. But, they can provide the international financial resources which need to complement domestic resources in Kenya.
“Solutions need to be scaled, accelerated. In the next few days, together with the UoN and Wangari Mathai Institute alongside the African Development Bank, we are convening a regional forum to have a conversation on what is needed to offer solutions to those affected by climate change," he said.
He said they will support Machakos residents get boreholes and dams as they had requested.
UoN deputy vice chancellor Jesang Hachingson said the varsity had received Sh400 million for research on climate-resilient infrastructure in the country.
“But going forward, we have other donors who funded us to find solutions to climate adaptations among communities,” Hachingson said.
"We have a whole range of support systems that looks into the value chain from community mobilization looking for solutions and indigenous knowledge so that communities can be co–creators and solution makers in their own ways."
He said they will then escalate that to the national level where they can involve the head of state and government.