IcFEM Gap Volunteers

Agriculture is one of the main areas which the Community Development Department specialise in. At the Mission we have split agriculture into 3 parts:

1.       Agriculture related to the Community

2.       Agriculture related to the School

3.       Agriculture related to the Hospital 

1. Agriculture related to the Community

IcFEM has realised that many young people especially mothers don't have the experience of farming which is a necessity in Kenya. If you don't know how to farm you will struggle to feed your children and you are unlikely to have any other sources of income. So the Mission set up a course which focuses on the teaching of agriculture to mothers, called 'Mother and Child Health Education'. The aim is to demonstrate to mothers how to plant crops and inform them about the different crops - range of crops, times of harvesting, suitability of and caring for the soil, nutrients of different crops. The hope is to provide food for the mother and child

Men of all ages are also encouraged to take part in these demonstrations. They are charged a small fee for the service and then they are taught how to plant and maintain the crops throughout the seasons. Once they have been taught these valuable skills then they can put their knowledge to the test. They do this by been designated a plot of land at the Dreamland Farm and start planting. Once the crop is ready to be harvested and they have learnt all the necessary skills then they harvest the crop and the Mission then sells the produce. The money goes back into the Mission to buy the seeds for the next group which is sustainable and the Mission doesn't lose any resources whilst the community learn how to farm and put the theory into practice on their own land.

2. Agriculture related to the School

The way the school uses the farm is very much the same as the community. The Mission has a primary school called the Dreamland Education Centre which is about 3km from town. In Kenya the primary school children are taught how to grow and maintain crop, this is within the 'Agriculture and Science' lesson. The areas which the students are taught are listed below:

• Planting
• Maintaining
• Pruning
• Spacing
• pH level of soils
• Types of soil (Sand, Clay etc.)
• How and what to feed dairy cows
• How to look after cows (Animal Management)
• The different species of cows

3. Agriculture related to the Hospital

The nurses at Dreamland Hospital inform future and present mothers about childcare - especially hygiene and nutrition. Once the nurses have gone through what they need to feed their children and in what quantities, then they are shown how to grow enough of each essential crop, so that the child has a balanced diet. The course is called 'Mother and Child Health Education' (see above for more information).

The Dreamland Farm isn't just a place to teach people how to grow and manage their crops, but is also a working farm which grows crops throughout the year, with an aim of generating money for the Mission.

But there is a fourth option

If you didn't feel confident enough to teach the community how to farm, you are able and encouraged to do get invloved with the farming yourself and in time might become more confident of supporting those in the community. Some of the activities which you’ll have the chance to be part of are as follows:

• Ploughing   
• Weeding
• Milking
• Irrigation
• Planting
• Fertilising
• Weeding
• Potting
• Uprooting
• Selling
• Recording
• Splitting 

So as you can see from the four aspects of agriculture above, the Mission specialises in many areas and we need your help to teach the community on how to lead a healthy life both for themselves and their children.  You will get involved with the community, learn more of their language and get to know the culture of Kenya. You would also be helping the Mission with your time as well as teaching the future people of Kenya on how to manage growing crops. So if you would like to get to know more about farming, help with the farming at the Dreamland Farm to generate income for the Mission or help teach the mothers and the children at the Dreamland School concerning agriculture this is the project for you.

Small scale farming is just as important as the farming which occurs at the Dreamland Farm, if not more so. The IcFEM Mission staff and gap year student go into the community to teach/ inform them of how important it is to grow their own crops.  We had a gap year student staying with the Mission during 2005 and he observed an elderly person working on his shamba and planting Maize and it shocked him how a 60+ year old man could plant maize without anybody helping him with the work. So from there we realised that gap year students could offer the elderly a lot. We decided that you could help in the shamba or even just in the kitchen garden which is a small plot of land where the house owner plants nourishing crops like carrots, cabbages, and sukumaweki.

When the Community Development Team go into the community and teach them on hygiene and sanitation they encourage people to have kitchen gardens with a dish rack. Many people in the community tend to wash their cutlery and place it on the grass or the ground to dry, which is very unhygienic as there is bacteria and germs. Many people are not educated enough to grow their own crops. Buying crops especially the crops which are not indigenous are very expensive compared to the price if they grew their own. Even the smallest thing of tying of a washing line to a couple of trees stops them having to put their clothes on the fences or bushes which also hold bacteria and germs. So we need gap year students to help the Mission with this activity which helps them against the community reduce the risk of illness and disease caused by being unhygienic.

You will learn how to grow and manage crops, guide the community on basic and inexpensive hygiene precautions and help with constructing basic appliances to help maintain their health and that of their families.

As part of caring for the environment the IcFEM Mission is setting up a tree nursery at the Dreamland Farm and we need the help of gap year students to help with the pre-treatment of seeds, preparing the soil, potting, watering, fertilising, pruning, planting, irrigation, weeding, recording, splitting of trees and uprooting. Our aim is to look after God's creation as well as generating income for His work within the Mission. The benefits which you would contribute towards are:

• Helping to purify water
• Encouraging precipitation
• Binding soil particles together through the root system, preventing soil erosion
• Prevent flooding
• Creating habitats for  wildlife especially the fantastic Kenyan birdlife
• Providing the Mission and local community with fuel and timber
• Improving soil fertility
• Reduces carbon dioxide in the air which helps to slow down global warming
• Producing fruits
• Indigenous trees tend to have chemicals to produce medicine
• Prevents the rivers from having too much sediment which can lead to flooding
• They add beauty to the environment
• Generates income for the Mission 

The project would encourage others to concern themselves with sustainability and is definitely for the long term. Seeds and saplings would need to be sought, the earth prepared, the site planned before planting and the crop of trees maintained.  

At the Dreamland Farm the Mission wants to construct bee hives which will be placed around the coffee plantation and the trees. The aim of having bee hives at Dreamland is to colonise bee's using the modern bee hives which will allow us to generate money for the Mission and to harness the wealth of  the Lord's creation. The benefits of keeping bees at the Dreamland Farm are:

• Diversifying existing farming enterprises
• Producing highly nourishing
• Income generation - despite being expensive, pure honey sells well
• Used as medicine
• Used as a preservative
• Used in the manufacturing of candles
• Very little cost to maintain and establish

There are two types of bee hives. The traditional hives are made from a log which has had the middle drilled out and has corrugated iron screwed to the sides with holes to allow the bees to enter. The modern hives are made from wood and produced in factories which are constructed by the buyer. We have realised that the modern hives are far better than the traditional hives, which tend to result in the destruction of the bees when extracting the honey and also it is difficult to see when the honey is ready. So the way the IcFEM Mission keeps bees is the modern way. Even though it is more expensive, you produce more income if the hives are in the right environment.