Oxfam tips farmers on traditional food crops
OMORO, October 4, 2023 – Oxfam International, a humanitarian agency fighting inequality and poverty has encouraged farmers in Northern Uganda to restore traditional food crops, saying they have a very high nutritional value but also can ensure food security.
Muhindo Jackson Rukara, who is the resilience and climate change coordinator with Oxfam Uganda, said local plants are also medicinal and should be restored, and protected.
He was days ago touring farmer field schools in Apac and Omoro districts during a farmer-managed seed systems caravan organised by Oxfam and its partner, Participatory Ecological Land Use Management [PELUM] Uganda.
He asked farmers to get embrace seed multiplication of the local crops to boost production.
“When we explain the importance of the local plants, people will start looking for them and start growing them on their own,” Rukara said.
“We are striving to see that a country is free of poverty and inequality and we thought that the seed multiplication programme is one of those programmes that will help people come out of poverty,” he added.
According to Rukara some of the the local plants include malakwang, carrots, simsim, pumpkin, groundnuts, leafy green, cauliflower, sweet potatoes, yam, onion and garlic among others.
Oxfam and its partners, PELUM Uganda, Eastern and Southern Africa Small-scale Farmers’ Forum [ESAFF], and others also conducted farmer-managed seed systems caravan in Teso, Lango, Acholi, and West Nile sub-regions.
Farmer-managed seed systems arrangement is an initiative to ensure food security and improved nutrition among the farming community, according to Rukara.
Christopher Ocen, the farmer school facilitator of Awinyo in Apac Municipality said most of the indigenous food plants such as green beans and others were getting extinct yet they are disease resistant, drought tolerant and had high food values.
Molly Ajok, of Waribucing Farmer Field School in Omoro district said medicinal plants and crops played a vital role when Covid-19 broke out in the country.
“We want to address the bottleneck why people are running away from local crops yet they are nutritious and can cure many diseases,” she said.
Joel Oyela, the chairperson of Apurpetur Farmer Field School said members are interested in growing traditional crops.
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