Livelihoods Mt Elgon Project: Empowering Farmers and Restoring Ecosystems

Smallholder farmers in Kenya's Mount Elgon region enhance their livelihoods through sustainable farming practices and market connections. At the same time, they sequester carbon dioxide.

The Livelihoods Mt Elgon project, implemented by Vi Agroforestry, aims to improve the livelihoods of 15 000 smallholder dairy farmers in the Mount Elgon region of Kenya. This project addresses poverty, environmental degradation, and climate change challenges by promoting sustainable farming practices and establishing connections to markets through 15 cooperatives. It will also sequester more than 1 million ton of CO2 equivalent and create tangible environmental benefits (water, biodiversity).

Sustainable agricultural land management practices

The project focuses on empowering farmers with Sustainable Agricultural and Land Management (SALM) practices, which help preserve biodiversity, water resources, and boost the local economy. By adopting these practices, farmers can increase their crop yields, improve milk production, and sequester carbon, contributing to climate change mitigation.

Farmers are trained on various SALM practices, including nutrient management, soil and water conservation, agronomic practices, agroforestry, tillage and residue management, integrated livestock management, and integrated pest management. These practices require limited financial investment and have proven efficiency in improving agricultural productivity.

Empowering farmers and cooperatives

The project also focuses on strengthening existing cooperatives and empowering women. Farmers are reached through farmer groups and cooperatives. Trainings are organized by field officers through demonstration farms and farmer trainers. The cooperatives are supported for milk collecting, cooling, and bulking.

The project strengthens the capacity of cooperatives to offer more services to their members, such as veterinary services and artificial insemination. Moreover, the governance of the cooperatives and their members is strengthened to enable women to participate more actively in the dairy value chain and decision-making at household and cooperative levels.

Environmental impact and climate change mitigation

Sustainable agricultural practices, agroforestry, and the protection of river banks contribute to watershed conservation and protection of Lake Victoria. Land restoration and agroforestry trees highly reduce soil erosion, and in the long run, increase soil fertility.

The project also mitigates climate change by binding CO2 in soil organic matter and trees planted. Furthermore, cows naturally emit greenhouse gasses when they digest food. But in this project, cows are fed with more nutritious and protein-rich fodder. This helps each cow be healthy and produce more milk, leading to less greenhouse gasses per liter of milk.

Innovative investment model

The project is developed through an innovative investment model. It is financed by the Livelihoods Fund, an investment fund created by private companies, who bear the investment risk. Brookside Dairy, a private company, co-invests in the project and pays according to milk production.

Read more here 

Film about the project

 

Facts about the project

Context: The Mount Elgon region is historically a densely populated area with fertile soils and high rainfall. However, extensive cultivation and fragmentation have led to environmental degradation and low agricultural yields.

Main purpose: Improve the livelihoods of smallholder farmers through sustainable farming and milk-water-carbon value creation, while preserving biodiversity and water resources.

Duration: 2016 – 2026

Location: Mount Elgon region, Kenya.

Target group: 30,000 smallholder farmers, including 15,000 dairy farmers.

Donors: Livelihoods Fund and Brookside Dairy Limited.

Implementing organisation: Vi Agroforestry.

More about the projects

Key goals

*Improved livelihoods for 30,000 farmers.*Increased milk production from 5000l/day to 135000l/day. *Adoption on sustainable agricultural practices on 35,000 ha of land. *Increase farmers crop yields by 30%. *Sequester 1 million of ton of co2 (2026).

Sustainable methods

* Nutrient management * Soil and water conservation * Agronomic practices * Agroforestry * Tillage and residue management * Integrated Livestock management * Integrated Pest management

Margaret Muchanga, a dairy farmer

“Before there was just a big field of maize – now there is a big field of income. I have learnt about fodder for dairy and planted it on my farm. I feed the cows now with calliandra, napier grass and maize and the milk production has improved”

Innovative investment model

The Mount Elgon project is financed by the Livelihoods Fund. Brookside Dairy, a private company co-invests and pay according to milk production and Vi Agroforestry implements the project in the field.