Makueni County is located in the former Eastern Province of Kenya. Makueni has grown to be famous for farming in recent years. Already, there are water management community projects like dams, irrigation schemes, and boreholes that boost agriculture, thereby bringing wealth to all.
Over 27,000 farmers from Makueni County had benefited from certified seeds distributed by the county government of Makueni for planting during the October–December rain season in 2023. Beneficiaries were drawn from II wards that had prioritized planting seeds during the budgeting process for the 2023 financial budget.
Living in Makueni County is Mr. Jimmy M. Sukali; he is a father of three sons, one daughter and a grandfather of two daughters.
“Before I decided to venture fully into farming, I worked as a manager for a tour and travel firm. I worked there until 1998, when there was the bomb blast in Nairobi affecting the company in terms of business and forcing me to go back home and venture fully into farming.”
“My father motivated me to venture into fruit farming. He used to farm oranges and mangoes. He taught me a lot about fruit farming.”
In the late 2000's, I decided to venture fully into fruit farming. I acquired ten (10 acres) of land where I had to call a professional from agriculture to come and do some tests on my soil so that he could advise me on how to go about it and which variety of fruits to plant.
Under the 10 acres, I have planted 1,300 pixie fruit plants, 640 oranges plants and 250 Mango plants. Inside my farm, I do not use fertilizers since they affect soil pH in the long term, but with composed manure, it helps improve the structure and health of the soil by adding organic matter.
In my last harvest, I got 8 tons of pixie fruits, where 1kg of the fruit goes for around 80 to 100 Kenya shillings, depending on the market. In return, I made Kshs 80,000 after selling the pixie fruit. With oranges, I harvested 1 ton and 1kg of oranges for around 30 to 40 Kshs, depending on the market price. In return, I earned up to Kshs 30,000 from 640 Orange plants. Mangoes are not that profitable since brokers purchase them in bulk, with one going for Kshs 5, while in the market they retail for Kshs 10, where the profit is very marginal.
Apart from that, I rear cows, which provide me with milk for sale to the community. I also buy small cows for fattening, and then I sell them for profit. On the other hand, they provide me with manure, which I use on the farm to boost soil nutrients. I have also employed workers who assist me with cultivating and managing the farm.
The main challenges that I face are the infection of pests and diseases in the plants. As of now, the price of insecticide is very expensive. For example, if I apply Thunder to the plants, one litre goes for Kshs 8,000and I must spray 10 acres.
With most people doing farming, the supply is in surplus, making the price shoot further down. This has become a challenge where the cost of living and production is very high since I have to pay my workers and buy insecticides.
By trying to increase the prices so as to get better profits, you end up not getting clients since they are also facing hard economic times. Most farmers in Makueni have also embarked on pixie farming, which has made the competition twice as hard.
For someone who would want to venture into farming, I would advise them to pursue fruit farming since the return on investment is very high and it doesn’t require a lot of input for better yields, which is cost-effective. Farming is the backbone of our economy.
A new report released today (Thursday 15th February) reveals, for the first time, strong correlations between news literacy and civic engagement amongst 9- to 11-year-olds in the UK, showing important wider societal reasons for encouraging our children's engagement with the news from an early age.
Research funded by The Nuffield Foundation and conducted by academics from the University of Birmingham and the University of Liverpool involved almost 2,000 participants from 40 schools across the UK. The project aimed to evaluate the NewsWise programme (designed by the Guardian Foundation in partnership with the National Literacy Trust and the PSHE Association) to better understand how news literacy in primary schools could be effectively educated and measured.
For the first time, the resulting report, 'Educating & Measuring News Literacy and Civic Engagement in 9- to 11-year olds', revealed a strong positive relationship between news literacy and civic engagement among this age group in the UK. This means that newsliteracy levels can be used to predict civic engagement and vice versa. The research also revealed key findings pertaining to children's attitudes of news literacy and civic engagement. These include:
Only three in ten 9- to 11-year-olds in the UK are interested in the news.
While the majority believe the news should be truthful and balanced, less than half (47%) know how to spot fake news.
Only 52% can name trustworthy places to find news and find it is easy to tell if a news story is real.
68% strongly agree or agree that adults should vote in elections, yet just under half say they will vote in an election themselves when they grow up (49% extremely likely or likely).
90% strongly agree or agree that it is important to know what is happening in the world.
57% believe adults should take part in peaceful protests.
And 61% say that when they grow up, they will regularly volunteer their time for good causes.
Researchers found that the participating schools selected to implement the NewsWise programme in classrooms demonstrated a clear improvement in the ability of their 9-11-year-old pupils to detect fake news, and that this improvement sustained over time. This finding is particularly significant as it was based on a performance-based, rather than self-report, measure used in the study.
Prof. Tom Harrison, Professor of Education and Deputy Pro Vice Chancellor: Education Innovation at University of Birmingham and the study's primary investigator says: "The need to educate our children in the realms of mis- and dis-information has been clear for a while, but what these findings really suggest for the first time is the ways in which our pupils' learnings around these subjects and engagement with the news have wider positive implications for society."
The research uncovered strong correlations between all dimensions of news literacy and of civic engagement among 9-11-year-olds, including:
their awareness of socio-political issues and motivation to follow the news,
such awareness and their self-reported ability to evaluate news stories, and
their participation in civic life (e.g., through community involvement) and interest in the news.
"These findings should make us all stop and ask ourselves, 'what's the purpose of education for this generation?'", Prof. Harrison continues. "Yes, literacy and numeracy are very important but in a world where career paths are no longer clear, space should be made in the curriculum for helping our children to develop the competencies, character and human qualities necessary to navigate the complexities and challenges of the modern world."
Elli Narewska, Head of NewsWise and Primary education at The Guardian Foundation adds: "There is a critical need for engaging and effective news and media literacy education in the 21st century, where there is potential for even greater spread of mis- and disinformation, which may be exacerbated through the rise of generative AI and other emerging technologies.
"The NewsWise programme was designed to equip primary school children aged 9-11 in the UK with the news literacy skills they need in order to thrive in the digital age and the findings from this research have shown it to be an effective tool that has wider implications beyond the education system. The relationship between news literacy and civic engagement is something we have seen in our work with children and teachers across a number of years; meaning that news literacy contributes to society in general."
Elli goes on to say: "As a result, key recommendations of this report are that policymakers and educators should consider news literacy and civic engagement from an early age, what children are learning in this space and how this can be enhanced through effective teaching methods and how it is measured. This can foster news literacy and civic engagement more effectively in our young learners, which is important in an era of rapid technological transformation."
Nuffield Foundation Programme Head, Ruth Maisey said: "To address the challenges of the future, education needs to equip children with the means to fully participate in society as responsible, engaged citizens. So, it is encouraging to see the development of interventions like NewsWise to help children detect misinformation, and the potential for news literacy interventions to enhance civic engagement."
The full 'Educating & Measuring News Literacy and Civic Engagement in 9- to 11-year olds' report can be found here.
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