By CHRIS KAKUNTA –

SHE hurriedly carries her basket full of maize cobs to her home a few metres away from where I was waiting for her. It is the maize crop that she and her sisters have been harvesting all day.
As she comes back for an interview with this author, she is breathless but happy that in this community, she is among the few that have a good maize harvest.
Thanks to the Conservation Agriculture Scaling-up (CASU) project, a project implemented by the Ministry of Agriculture in partnership with the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) with generous financial support from the European Union(EU), which 31 year old Juliet Chisenga Kabamba has embraced as a member and lead farmer.
Juliet has been struggling to look after her old and ailing parents who retired from the mines when she was just 12 years old.
As a former miner, her father retired 18 years ago and decided to settle in her home of Lusaka village, in Chief Kalaba’s area in Mansa District of Luapula Province.
In this village, Mr Kabamba tried everything including fishing, which is the main occupation for the people of Luapula Province but nothing was working.
Equally, the pension he had obtained from the mine could not meet his daily necessities and that of his family.
Last year however, things begun to change as Juliet was recruited by the Ministry of Agriculture under the FAO/EU supported CASU project to participate in the training on Conservation Agriculture, a technology that is transforming lives and creating wealth among participating farmers.
Conservation Agriculture (CA) is being promoted by the stakeholders in the agriculture sector not only because of its ability to help farmers attain food security and incomes for their families but also its ability to withstand adverse weather effects.
In a season like the 2015/16, when almost all parts of the country were facing too much or too little rainfall, Juliet and  other participating farmers have their own stories to tell but more importantly, the crop yields harvested show that CA remains the best option for small holder farmers in achieving household food security and increasing their incomes.
Last year, Juliet said, “I produced 7 x 50 kilogramme bags of maize on a lima because I did not use the CA technique but this year, as you can see, am expecting close to 80 x 50 kilogrammes bags of maize from the two lima I planted through support from FAO”.
Another farmer beneficiary, Abraham Kasongo from Luena camp of Kawambwa district said,
“We got our inputs through the e-voucher system just within Kawambwa and planted on time. I am expecting at least 35-40 x 50kg bags of maize from just a lima.”
Juliet and Abraham are among the several farmers that this author talked to in a recent trip to Kawambwa, Mwense, Mansa and Samfya.
Generally, the over 90,000 farmers benefiting from the CASU project testify that the project has changed their livelihoods, forever.
Historically, Luapula province has not been a major food producer in Zambia because of the then thriving fishing industry which the people of that area have depended on since time immemorial.
With dwindling fish stocks and other social and economic factors impacting negatively on the people of Luapula, a new livelihood is being sought and the best option so far, has been to empower the people of Luapula with the necessary skills to work on the land.
CA has found an opportune time to turn around the people’s perceptions and attitudes because all other means have failed them and hopes for a better future seemed to have been fading.
The concept of CA rests upon three pillars: Minimum soil disturbance, crop rotation and permanent organic soil cover.
These could be said to be fundamental but other factors such as early planting, weed and pest management, quality seed as well as appropriate application of fertilisers are equally important.
CASU’s approach to recruitment of farmers under this programme begins with the identification of a Lead Farmer, who is trained and in turn, required to recruit and train 15 other people called follower Farmers.
The training is centered on the concept of CA which most people also refer to as sustainable agriculture.
This includes some aspects of land preparations which the project emphasises to farmers that it should be done early soon after harvesting.
Land preparations may be in the form of basins, for farmers using the Chaka hoe (hoe deliberately designed to open-up the earth), or the use of a ripper mounted either to a pair of oxen or to a tractor.
Ripping facilitates digging deeper into the soil between 25-40 centimetres.
This helps break the hard pan in the soil thereby facilitating smooth air and water filtration in the soil, which also enables the soil to improve its water holding capacity, an important element in times of too much or too little rainfall.
The second aspect involves training the farmers on the need to conserve the soil and maintaining crop and other residues in the fields.
Burning and clearing of crop and other residues in the fields is not encouraged because the latter are used to protect the soil from direct heat. The crop residue also acts as manure for the field when fully decomposed.
CA expert with the Conservation Farming Unit (CFU) Cephas Mkandawire notes that Management of Soil Cover Hinges on Farmers’ Discipline.
Mr Mkandawire says a previous well managed crop grown at optimum plant population and good growth vigour won’t only give a farmer good grain yield but equally good density of trash.
It improves soil fertility and mitigates soil erosion and compaction. It buffers crops from acidity and extreme temperature.
He says in Zambia crop residue management is a big challenge because of poor crop yields and conventional harvesting methods.
Whereas, combine harvesting leaves residues well spread out in the field most harvesting methods used by smallholders tend to do the opposite.
This challenge is even worse in legumes. Traditionally farmers collect all legume shoots and take it to the homestead for threshing.
Regrettably the residue is not returned to the field. Instead it’s either burnt in hips or fed to livestock.
“We want crop residues to achieve the principle of soil cover in the field to improve soil health. We don’t want weeds that will subsequently give us an economic burden to control and sabotage our farming,” he said.
It has been observed that some keen conservation farming adopters achieve the soil cover by importing residue from distant fields.
This is good but it comes at a huge logistical cost. This cost must be avoided by having a good crop that leaves enough trash not only for soil cover but to feed livestock.
For farmers under CASU, leaving crop residue in the fields has become a religious obligation that cannot be broken because long term impact of crop residue will alternatively reduce as the fields will be able to generate its own manure other than buying synthetic fertilisers.
Associated with this, is the maintenance of the planning basins on lines every season so that no any other part of field is cultivated other than the original planting places.
This ensures continuity in terms of soil and other nutritional requirements for the crops that are rotated in that farming system.
This means for CA to work effectively, a farmer must practice crop rotation. Crop rotation demands the growing of different crops on one piece of land in a manner that allows a symbiotic relationship among crops being grown.
In this case, a legume crop like cowpeas or groundnuts is followed by maize, which is also followed by a deep-rooted crop like cotton.
Alternatively, some farmers under the CASU project have also included horticultural crops in the farming system so as to keep the soil busy and increase their income opportunities.
One such farmer is 30 year old John Mwila of Twingi village in Chief Mulakwa of Samfya District in Luapula Province who has been cashing in about K4, 000 per season from growing tomatoes, egg plants, cabbage and rape from the same field where he grows major crops.
John says apart from growing crops supported by CASU, he has found it necessary and unavoidable to grow various crops throughout the year.
“As a youth, through CASU, I have come to appreciate crop rotation and diversification. I have money throughout the year just like someone working in Samfya town,” John said.
He has since called upon other youths in the area that may have difficulties in finding jobs to turn to agriculture and become part of the conservation agriculture revolution that is spreading so fast in Luapula, an area that was never thought of being a contributor to the national food security.
CASU lead farmers are supported through the e-voucher system to redeem among the various choices various inputs such as seed, herbicides, sprayers and fertilisers.
It is this component under CA that has helped  the over  335,000 farmers to have access to inputs within their locality and to also plant early as per CA requirement, taking advantage of the first rains as the planting stations would be ready and inputs would also be within the farmers’ households.
Although Luapula seem to be in its infancy in terms of the numbers participating in CA, there is great enthusiasm among farmers to increase their hectarage if they are to maximise their potential.
One obvious challenge has been the use of a Chaka hoe which a farmer cannot use for over a hectare.
Farmers talked to requested CASU to also include livestock and the necessary farming equipment so that they can increase their farm hectare.
The project Coordinator Mphatso Mtendere confirmed that the project will be linking farmers to already existing mechanisation service providers and private sector to facilitate financing for mechanisation equipment through e-vouchers in the 2016/2017 agriculture season.
“We are aware of the challenges faced by farmers in reaching their full potential and low level of mechanisation is one of them. CASU has thus recruited over 400 potential mechanisation service providers for CASU farmers to access mechanisation services,” he said.
Suffice to say that their concerns have also been noticed by Agriculture Minister Given Lubinda who on many occasions, while appreciating the greater role that CA has played in Zambia’s food security, the use of a hand hoe, he says, belongs to the archives and the need to mechanise CA is increasingly becoming inevitable.
So far, CASU’s programmes in Luapula Province in enhancing food security and creating wealth for the people are bearing fruit.
It is hoped that   many more farmers would be included on the programme so that poverty levels in that area are reduced.-NAIS.