Project News

From February 20th to 24th, 2023, I participated in the SHEP Biz Joint Extension Staff & Farmers Dual (2) Gender (JEF2G) training in Homa Bay for Migori County as an observer. As a JICA volunteer, I am working to disseminate rice cultivation techniques in my assigned area. I decided to participate in this training because I wanted to learn how to conduct market survey.

From beginning to end, the training was filled with enthusiasm from participants. The officers of the Ministry of Agriculture, SHEP Biz project members who gave the lectures as organizers expressed their desire to improve the lives of farmers through this training. In addition, the participants seriously worked on each activity through trial and error with members in the same group. I felt participants were reliable by seeing how they used their imagination to think about profit, loss, and various risks, and how they came up with ideas while looking back on their experiences.

The most impressive thing was the crop selection activity. Based on market survey, participants determined which crops would be most profitable. However, the crops that the members ultimately chose to grow based on that chart were not the most profitable crops. When I asked why, group members answered like these. "It's less risky to choose crops with experience in cultivation" or "Even if the income per area is low, the crops are popular in the market." I learned that the interesting point of SHEP is that there is no right or wrong answer. Farmers' choices are definitely based on the market, and I felt that the purpose of the training was achieved to change the way of thinking from "Grow and Sell" to "Grow to Sell."

I learned a lot not only about how to conduct market survey, but also how to run a workshop. I would like to make use of what I learned this time to work with farmers to develop a market for rice in my activity.

Market survey

Crop selection activity

Creating an action plan