Planting water through regenerative agriculture in Homabay County

This project holistically addresses the water-related challenges faced by the Ogongo and Luanda community, whilst aiming to make agricultural improvements additionally. It combines decentralized drinking water services put into place by Wable with regenerative agroforestry by our partner reNature amongst our local stakeholders. The regenerative agriculture will be used to restore the water cycle, improve soil health and provide additional income sources for farmers. The project aims to reach about 10.000 community members through cleaner accessible drinking water as well as increased food security, economic resilience for farmers and additional ecosystem services.

Ogongo and Luanda inhabitants are facing challenges such as lack of access to clean drinking water and climate change impacts are increasingly threatening livelihoods and food supplies. More than 50% of its members are farmers producing cash crops in monoculture systems to sell and feed the community. Increased prevalence of droughts and flooding harms agricultural productivity and water availability. Sufficient water availability needs to be ensured to maintain agricultural productivity.

Intervention

Regenerative Agroforestry can stabilize agricultural productivity, enhance water cycles, and improve farmer livelihoods. reNature will utilize those attributes by helping Ogongo and Luanda farmers to transform their farms into agroforestry systems. reNature will implement a Model Farm to fine-tune and showcase the most suitable systems in the local context. Building upon this ‘stepping stone’, a Model School will be implemented focusing on participatory capacity-building and inspiration among farmers.

Objective

Developing and implementing a farming system that enhances water availability, soil health, yield size, and diversity, whilst withstanding a changing climate.

Inspirational Impact

The Model Farm will serve as an example for best practices for local agriculture. Farmers can see, learn from it and participate, whilst implementing the system on their own farm. Wable will engage community members in capacity-building, providing training materials and information. Their local stewards will stimulate the regenerative agricultural practices.

Environmental Impact

By ensuring water availability, the project will support plant and animal life. Improving soil health will increase its ability to hold water and foster biodiversity. Regenerative Agroforestry will increase climate resilience of local ecosystems as well as carbon sequestration capacities on and beyond the farmland. Thus, it contributes to counteracting climate change.

Social Impact

The community of Ogongo and Luanda will benefit through increased availability of clean drinking water. Further, Regenerative Agroforestry will boost the diversity and abundance of healthy, locally sourced food, whilst increasing food security. Other social advantages will include reduced time spent for fetching firewood – mainly benefitting women -, microclimate regulation and more attractive recreational spaces.

Economic Impact

Introducing Regenerative Agroforestry in Ogongo and Luanda will stabilize yields against the impacts of climate change and can increase agricultural productivity. Thus, farmers’ economic resilience will be raised. The community will ultimately be affected through ‘trickle-down’ effects. Further, greater availability of commodities locally may reduce the need for food imports.

Want to help solving Ogongo’s and Luanda’s water challenges?

This project is open to financing.

Save Lake Victoria #beatplasticpollution Campaign

Wable has joined hands with Young Environmentalists in Homabay County. With support from Utrecht4GlobalGoals we had the campaign #SaveLakeVictoria on World Clean Up Day 18th September 2021.

“We have made it our responsibility to restore, protect and conserve sections of Lake Victoria that have been greatly affected by plastic pollution, create awareness on proper waste management and build a platform for innovative ways of creating job opportunities among the youths around the region from our campaigns as a long lasting solution to pollution menace” – Omondi bill Clinton, campaign lead #savelakevictoria

Join us in the campaign!

Share, like and participate in our online chats on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and Facebook.

Join us in our clean up actions (stay tuned for our next action date).

Support us with a financial contribution via the donation button.

Thank you!

Social and environmental re-generation project

Water pan and calabash planting in Homabay County with thanks for the support from Utrecht4GlobalGoals.

When water is stored in a farm, it becomes resilient against drought and floods. By creating this water Pan we have sustainable water access, storage, security and reliability. In addition to the pan water recovery, we have planted the calabash crop around the waterpan that works to increase the soil microbial activity which is the foundation of healthy clean water. The calabash is recyclable and is used to drink, store and transport water. It is a very healthy vegetable as well.

Wable Water Points Homabay County

December 2020 – It’s party time in Ogongo and Luanda as the local communities open their Water Points. The local community is in attendance at the opening of the two Wable Water Points in Homabay County. There is singing, dancing, everyone enjoys the tasty water and drinks it from the traditional gourds. National television Citizen TV reports on this special moment.

In the previous months, team Wable has been working intensively with the local communities, Homabay County Government and with the support of RvO (Invest International) to build the two Water Points. Knowledge and experiences are shared during the preparations, the building process of the Water Points, the installation of the water treatment systems and the MSafi ATM, but also through capacity building workshops and training courses. In the process, a local team from the community is trained to take care of the day-to-day management of the Water Points, the maintenance of the water treatment system and the MSafi ATM. The community is informed about the importance of drinking clean and safe drinking water through engagement of a local education team transferring the knowledge.

Citizen TV documentary