Free Farmers from Poverty & Educate their Children

While our projects in Dire Dawa and Harar are continuing and increasing, with hundreds farmers trained, this time we would like to tell you about our next adventure – Afar. Our team, Eden Peled and Faysal Abdi, visited Samara, a new city founded about 15 years ago as the capital of the Afar district. It is a very challenging, remote region with though weather conditions. The area around the city is practically a desert, disturbed only by the green streak of the Awash, one of Ethiopia’s largest rivers. Smallholder agriculture around Samara is dominated by herding and wandering, with very little horticulture, even though the combination of excellent soil, lots of water and sun and plenty of free land, is a paradise for vegetable production.

Meeting with the president of the university of Samara and the stuff of the College of Agriculture, the team learnt that agriculture in general, and vegetables production in particular are very undeveloped in the district, with almost no access to improved varieties, fertilizers and chemicals. The team visited Dubti, a small rural town, a 25-minute drive from Samara, situated in the heart of the green Awash area. Around the town they could see the beginning of agriculture production, but the level is still very low – exactly the type of place Fair Planet can make a huge difference. Visiting onion producing farmers, the team learned that the seeds are bought in Addis Ababa and other inputs are very hard to come by. The knowledge is lacking and the yields are very low. Yes, this is the perfect place for the next Fair Planet project. Stay tuned.