In the vicinity of homesteads in Kiryandongo refugee settlement, clean, well-set vegetable gardens blossom. The majority of the backyard farms are operated by women who also practice mixed farming, intercropping, mulching, growing high-breed crops, using organic fertilisers and carrying out irrigation farming that keeps them producing all year round.

Enid Karungi, the senior agricultural officer of Kiryandongo district, has appreciated the fact that some women in Kiryandongo district are working tirelessly to overcome the dangers brought about by a variety of human activities that are destructive and dangerous to the environment. 

She was able to admit that Kiryandongo district is facing climate change effects, like prolonged dry season and increased temperatures.

However, Karungi said different experts from the environmental office, the Agriculture and Production Department are doing their best to avert this condition by encouraging farmers to practice small-scale irrigation as they pump water from the swamps nearby them.

The district experts are also giving out different species of trees like avocados, macadamia, coffee seedlings, banana suckers, and even encouraging farmers to do mixed farming, and mulching practices that preserve the soil moisture.

On land of about three to four acres, Florence Nyabgoma  of Nyabuloni village together with her husband are practicing horticulture growing crops like cabbages, egg plants, sukumawiki, nofulla, bananas and coffee.

She said they decided to grow vegetables because they manure very fast and normally the yield is high. 

They resorted to planting bananas and coffee as a way of preserving land since coffee leaves add manure to the soil and they plan to mulch the plantation to preserve water in the soil.

In their garden, they use foliar fertilisers, urea and other herb fertilisers. Besides, pesticides are other game players as they help them fight the parasites from their crop.

Nyangoma testified that through farming, she has managed to pay school fees for her two children, who have attained a diploma and a degree, while others study in the best schools. To ease their gardening, they managed to buy cows and oxen, which they use for ploughing land and also collect some money from the community who use their service.

This has enabled them to buy a generator plus a horse pipe they use for irrigation. The generator helps in pumping water from the nearby seasonal swamp to ease irrigation. Though their biggest challenge is still water, as this swamp doesn’t survive the prolonged dry spell.

The unstable market from Kiryandongo and Bweyale is also another challenge they are experiencing as prices normally fluctuate, hence their getting losses sometimes.

Nyangoma showed me her happiness as she told me that they have been able to transfer this knowledge to community members and her children. This was evident as two men were being trained on the ground.

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Atim Florence of Kalangala village is another farmer who has adopted climate agricultural practices like mulching, irrigation, making organic manure from green plants and dead leaves to challenge the unpredictable weather conditions.

Atim is practising agriculture on one and a half acres of land. She grows cabbage, eggplants, onions and banana plantations and also rears pigs.

On Atim’s farm, mulching is her game changer, as this helps her preserve moisture in the soil and add manure. This explains why her vegetables were looking good despite the dry season.

Additionally, Atim has composite pits, which she uses for manufacturing her manure. She said she mixes green leaves, dry ones, dead plants and animal droppings from goats, pigs and cow dung to make manure.

Irrigation at Atim’s farm is powered by a solar panel of 120 watts that pumps water from a dug shallow well to a tank of about 1,000 litres, which supplies the garden through pipes that were connected to the whole garden to ease the irrigation process. 

This solar system was provided to her by Action Against Hunger, and Atim said that making organic manure was taught to her by Raising the Village organisation, a community-based organisation promoting clean energy alternatives.

Accordingly, said Karungi, Atim Florence and Nyangoma Josephine are two examples of women who have changed the community.

The production of this story was supported by InfoNile in partnership with Climate Smart Jobs