Kondoa
A visit to the Administrative Secretary of the Kondoa District signalled our official arrival to the Kondoa Eroded Area that we all knew so much about. He gave us general information: 179 villages, 400,000 residents, 13,220 km2, electricity for five years, etc. After this formality we headed over to the office of the infamous Hifadhi Ardhi Dodoma (HADO) for an educational presentation on their work in the Kondoa Eroded Area (KEA). They explained what had led to the problems in the KEA, what HADO had done to ameliorate the situation and how successful they had been. We hit a bump in the Q & A when one student asked about corruption; an uncomfortable laugh and pass was all we got.
After the presentation we had a walk around the area. We saw nurseries run by a local women’s group and another run by a man. Seedlings cost around 150 shillings each and the species grown include Cupressus lusitanica, Gravellia spp., guava (Psidium spp.), passion fruit (Passiflora edulis) and papaya (Carica papaya). After the nurseries we visited a major source of water for the area, an impressive covered spring. The turquoise water welling up from a deep rift ten metres across is diverted into concrete canals and used to irrigate crops.
We got back into the cars and drove out into the countryside to visit an old farmer. The shade of a baobab offered respite from the heat as Linda peppered the farmer with questions. We were able to ask about his agricultural techniques through a translator from HADO. He told us about crop rotation, land preparation, irrigation, harvesting and storage, animal husbandry and more.
We finished our day with a trip to Jerry’s survey plots to look at vegetation recovery. The whole area has been subject to intense erosion, as evidenced but the roots of older trees. One large baobab stands out in my memory: the huge roots are around a metre above the present soil surface. While the forestry group ran transects and counted species, my group measured soil temperature. We had no tools so we only managed to measure the first few centimetres. When we finished we went on a short walk with Jan to look at some birds. On the walk back I stopped to climb up a baobab tree. The climb seemed a bit too easy and I made it up quite a ways before Christian pointed out that there was a man-made beehive in the tree, no wait, two… Uh, another, and two more over there… I have never climbed down a tree so fast.
Why so much science? What is this?
After the presentation we had a walk around the area. We saw nurseries run by a local women’s group and another run by a man. Seedlings cost around 150 shillings each and the species grown include Cupressus lusitanica, Gravellia spp., guava (Psidium spp.), passion fruit (Passiflora edulis) and papaya (Carica papaya). After the nurseries we visited a major source of water for the area, an impressive covered spring. The turquoise water welling up from a deep rift ten metres across is diverted into concrete canals and used to irrigate crops.
We got back into the cars and drove out into the countryside to visit an old farmer. The shade of a baobab offered respite from the heat as Linda peppered the farmer with questions. We were able to ask about his agricultural techniques through a translator from HADO. He told us about crop rotation, land preparation, irrigation, harvesting and storage, animal husbandry and more.
We finished our day with a trip to Jerry’s survey plots to look at vegetation recovery. The whole area has been subject to intense erosion, as evidenced but the roots of older trees. One large baobab stands out in my memory: the huge roots are around a metre above the present soil surface. While the forestry group ran transects and counted species, my group measured soil temperature. We had no tools so we only managed to measure the first few centimetres. When we finished we went on a short walk with Jan to look at some birds. On the walk back I stopped to climb up a baobab tree. The climb seemed a bit too easy and I made it up quite a ways before Christian pointed out that there was a man-made beehive in the tree, no wait, two… Uh, another, and two more over there… I have never climbed down a tree so fast.
Why so much science? What is this?
