Unfortunate Market Info, Mombasa, and Coast Life
I have given up on the hopelessly corrupt Kenya Program for Disable People and after several meetings in Nairobi I finally came across a legitimate organization for the disabled (detailed email and fundraising effort coming soon!). Also, after speaking to three different Nairobi-based marketing organizations, I have concluded that the market for sweet potato chips has dried up. This is particularly troubling. The entire network has been thoroughly trained in growing and processing sweet potato chips with the expectation that there is a very good market for the value-added cash crop. In fact, due to the previous volunteer preaching the word of Sweet Potato and plenty of encouragement from the FAO, sweet potatoes are the only focus crop the network currently has. I’ve been working at diversification since I came on board and finally some success is being made, but it is surprising to me that the network made it as far as it has with this all eggs in one basket mentality.
Here’s how I think it happened: Someone, somewhere told the network that a miller in Nairobi was paying 80 shillings per kg of dried chips, which is a ridiculously high price. The Kenya Agricultural Commodities Exchange is said to have confirmed this, and the network was told the market was there as long as we get certified, which after an extraordinary amount of effort was completed through the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI) and Rhoda Nungo a few months back. Meanwhile, the previous volunteer’s farming-as-a-business training, all of the posters on the walls of our office, and everything discussed in the field encouraged farmers to pull up their sugarcane and start growing orange fleshed potatoes. Many of them listened, and I am afraid they are going to get burned for it. Certificate in hand, I spoke to the KACE office in Nairobi, who then contacted the mill only to learn that they are no longer purchase the dried chips. I later learned that the most they ever purchased was 2 tons, while our network currently has almost 7 tons of chips to sell. There is one other organization that is using dried chips in the nearby district of Busia, but despite all of their efforts they are only selling around 300kg a month and the supply from Busia farmers far exceeds the demand. Due to this they are buying up potatoes at only 5 shillings per kg, which is keeping the farmers about as poverty-stricken as they are with sugar cane. My only hope as far as the chips are concerned is that we can create our own market with the grant money I was approved of through the Ministry of Agriculture. Then again, six months have passed with no definite word, and I’m not incredibly optimistic the funding will come through.
On a more positive note there’s a chance I can find a decent market for the fresh potatoes if not the dried roots; Lord knows we have enough to sell. I have an appointment scheduled in Nairobi next Monday for a market buying potatoes for 700 shillings per 98kg bag, which isn’t much but better than nothing. It certainly isn’t the 8,000 shillings per bag promised to the farmers for dried chips in the past.
Now on to more positive things: I love the Kenya Coast. It’s just beautiful and life is good here. People are very chill and relaxed, and I am surprised by the diversity. People on the coast are about half Christians and half Muslim, with a few Hindus here and there as well. Beyond mere tolerance everyone gets along very well…its hakuna matata at its finest. This weekend I played soccer on the beach with a mixed team of Christians and Muslims, and the people playing were Swahili, Somali, Indian, and Omani (plus two wazungu). Anyone that thinks black Africans all look similar is mistaken. After a year here I can distinguish between a Kikuyu and a Luo tribesman, and it’s not difficult to differentiate a Sudanese from an Ethiopian from a Somali. Something else interesting: While Kenya was under control of the British the coast was actually ruled by the Middle Eastern country of Oman. When Kenya achieved independence in the 1960’s, Oman gave back the coast while England relinquished the mainland. As a result there is a distinctive Arab flair to the coast and it feels like a completely different country than Western Kenya.
Because the train from Nairobi was full I took the night bus to Mombasa. I was a little nervous about it because it is not recommended by Peace Corps, but I had no problems and actually slept quite well. I contacted a Peace Corps volunteer staying in Mombasa, and even though she was gone for her Close-of-Service conference she left me her keys and I was able to crash at her house that evening. Peace Corps is great for travel connections. After unloading my things I took a matatu to the old town to look around. I started at Fort Jesus, which was a Portuguese fort build to fight for domination of the spice and slave trade against the Arab city-states that dotted the coast in the 1500’s. The fort changed hands many times and has a long and bloody history, but I found it interesting and was treated to my first view of the Indian Ocean from the top of the fort.
Afterwards I went into old town and had a fruit drink called “skud”, which is banana, passion, and pineapple blended with avocado juice and homemade ice cream. It was one of the best drinks I’ve ever had and all the food I tried on the coast (a fish curry called Biriani, Chicken Tikka, Coconut Beans, kabobs) was amazing. I wish the culinary culture of the coast could somehow find its way to Kakamega. I then started wandering around the streets of old town, and was surrounded by Muslim culture: men wearing skull caps, white robes, and sandals, women wearing black robes called burkas that cover their entire bodies except for a narrow slit for the eyes, and young girls with henna paintings on their hands and feet.
As I was wandering though the narrow streets I came across a group of wazungu women and a skinny jet-black kid who was almost seven feet tall. I stopped to listen as a man came up to them and warned them not to continue down the road. He said there were drug addicts everywhere that would not hesitate to kill them and take their money. A bit concerned myself, I decided to stop and listen. After the guy’s spiel one of the women told him he was being ridiculous and to bugger off. It turns out he was a tour guide who did not like people walking through the old town without paying for his service, and was just using fear tactics to scare people into going with him. The assertive woman that told the man to leave has lived in Mombasa for 18 years, and the other two women she was with, a woman named Zelda and her college-aged daughter named Ariel, turned out to be the sister and niece of Sylvia, the Peace Corps medical officer for Kenya! It’s a small world and once I told them I was Peace Corps we hit it off well. We walked with the woman living in Mombasa down the perfectly safe road to her very nice house and she treated us to drinks and told us a bit about her project working with orphan children and drug addicts. She then excused herself and I spent the rest of the day with Zelda, Ariel, and the beanpole kid. The kid turned out to be a Sudanese refugee named Joseph who had escaped to Kenya. He lived at the airport for three months with nowhere to go and was taken care of by sympathetic airport employees. He was eventually found and assisted by Zelda, the sister of the Peace Corps Medical Officer. Zelda is married to an American Embassy guy and is living in Nairobi. She put Joseph into a secondary school in Nakuru where he is a star basketball player. He enjoys the sport because he claims it is so easy to dunk the ball, and starting up at the guy I have no reason to doubt it. He was the nicest kid and it breaks my heart to know how many similar cases are still stuck in the horrors of Southern Sudan.
At the recommendation of the woman from Mombasa we went to Heller Park, named after an environmentalist who 30 years ago converted an old gravel quarry into a game park. It was a nice hike and we saw plenty of Hippos, Buffalo, Snakes, and Crocodiles behind fencing as well as birds and monkeys everywhere. There was even a giant Galapagos turtle roaming around and I went for a ride on his shell. Afterwards, we went back to Mombasa for dinner and I took a terrifying Tuk-Tuk (three wheeled taxi) ride back to the PCV’s house to call it an evening. I have Zelda’s contact info now and a free place to stay the next time I am in Nairobi, so all in all things worked out pretty well.
The next day I left for Kilifi and to visit Soren, a PCV living on the coast. Soren is also working with the FAO but as a public health volunteer. He wanted to know more about farming as a business and how it can help the Kilifi Network farmers, and I was more than happy to meet up with a volunteer living on the coast. As soon as I arrived we piled into the back of a pickup truck and went to the field, and along the way we passed hundreds of small farms full of cashew nut and coconut trees. The coconut trees are over 50ft high and have notches cut into them, enabling a barefoot farmer to shimmy up to the top and throw coconuts to the ground below. There is also a tree here called the baobab and it is beautiful. They are ancient, grizzled trees with trunks that must be 15 feet across, and they are considered by many to be sacred. The field day was a bit low key compared to Kakamega, without as much singing and dancing, but it was a good experience, and I had a chance to fill myself with “madafu”, or fresh coconut milk. After our day in the field we went to a bar overlooking the crystal clear blue waters of the Indian Ocean, enjoyed a few drinks, and called it a night.
The following day was fantastic. Soren lives within walking distance of the beach and I laid out on the white sands and soaked up sunshine. It was low tide and I could walk into the sea for what seemed like miles without it ever becoming deep. Meanwhile I was able to look down and see sea urchins, brightly colored starfish, and an assortment of other sea animals that would be very bad to step on. I’m extremely tempted to get dive certified while I am here. We stopped for lunch at a resort hotel wanting 1500 shillings for a buffet lunch, but using Swahili we convinced the guy that we were not tourists we were able to eat for 500 shillings each, and the food was great. The price is negotiable for everything but a newspaper in this country. We went back to the beach and I read a book while a group of Kenyan women were standing nearby tenderizing an octopus by hurling it against a rock hundreds of times.
On Sunday we went back towards Mombasa and went to the public beach for a game of soccer. I then went into town to watch Pirates of the Carribean 2, a great movie, and went back to Kilifi for a great dinner too. I’m in the Kilifi FFS Network office now and I just finished a meeting with their network officials that went really well. Life on the coast is good.
Here’s how I think it happened: Someone, somewhere told the network that a miller in Nairobi was paying 80 shillings per kg of dried chips, which is a ridiculously high price. The Kenya Agricultural Commodities Exchange is said to have confirmed this, and the network was told the market was there as long as we get certified, which after an extraordinary amount of effort was completed through the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI) and Rhoda Nungo a few months back. Meanwhile, the previous volunteer’s farming-as-a-business training, all of the posters on the walls of our office, and everything discussed in the field encouraged farmers to pull up their sugarcane and start growing orange fleshed potatoes. Many of them listened, and I am afraid they are going to get burned for it. Certificate in hand, I spoke to the KACE office in Nairobi, who then contacted the mill only to learn that they are no longer purchase the dried chips. I later learned that the most they ever purchased was 2 tons, while our network currently has almost 7 tons of chips to sell. There is one other organization that is using dried chips in the nearby district of Busia, but despite all of their efforts they are only selling around 300kg a month and the supply from Busia farmers far exceeds the demand. Due to this they are buying up potatoes at only 5 shillings per kg, which is keeping the farmers about as poverty-stricken as they are with sugar cane. My only hope as far as the chips are concerned is that we can create our own market with the grant money I was approved of through the Ministry of Agriculture. Then again, six months have passed with no definite word, and I’m not incredibly optimistic the funding will come through.
On a more positive note there’s a chance I can find a decent market for the fresh potatoes if not the dried roots; Lord knows we have enough to sell. I have an appointment scheduled in Nairobi next Monday for a market buying potatoes for 700 shillings per 98kg bag, which isn’t much but better than nothing. It certainly isn’t the 8,000 shillings per bag promised to the farmers for dried chips in the past.
Now on to more positive things: I love the Kenya Coast. It’s just beautiful and life is good here. People are very chill and relaxed, and I am surprised by the diversity. People on the coast are about half Christians and half Muslim, with a few Hindus here and there as well. Beyond mere tolerance everyone gets along very well…its hakuna matata at its finest. This weekend I played soccer on the beach with a mixed team of Christians and Muslims, and the people playing were Swahili, Somali, Indian, and Omani (plus two wazungu). Anyone that thinks black Africans all look similar is mistaken. After a year here I can distinguish between a Kikuyu and a Luo tribesman, and it’s not difficult to differentiate a Sudanese from an Ethiopian from a Somali. Something else interesting: While Kenya was under control of the British the coast was actually ruled by the Middle Eastern country of Oman. When Kenya achieved independence in the 1960’s, Oman gave back the coast while England relinquished the mainland. As a result there is a distinctive Arab flair to the coast and it feels like a completely different country than Western Kenya.
Because the train from Nairobi was full I took the night bus to Mombasa. I was a little nervous about it because it is not recommended by Peace Corps, but I had no problems and actually slept quite well. I contacted a Peace Corps volunteer staying in Mombasa, and even though she was gone for her Close-of-Service conference she left me her keys and I was able to crash at her house that evening. Peace Corps is great for travel connections. After unloading my things I took a matatu to the old town to look around. I started at Fort Jesus, which was a Portuguese fort build to fight for domination of the spice and slave trade against the Arab city-states that dotted the coast in the 1500’s. The fort changed hands many times and has a long and bloody history, but I found it interesting and was treated to my first view of the Indian Ocean from the top of the fort.
Afterwards I went into old town and had a fruit drink called “skud”, which is banana, passion, and pineapple blended with avocado juice and homemade ice cream. It was one of the best drinks I’ve ever had and all the food I tried on the coast (a fish curry called Biriani, Chicken Tikka, Coconut Beans, kabobs) was amazing. I wish the culinary culture of the coast could somehow find its way to Kakamega. I then started wandering around the streets of old town, and was surrounded by Muslim culture: men wearing skull caps, white robes, and sandals, women wearing black robes called burkas that cover their entire bodies except for a narrow slit for the eyes, and young girls with henna paintings on their hands and feet.
As I was wandering though the narrow streets I came across a group of wazungu women and a skinny jet-black kid who was almost seven feet tall. I stopped to listen as a man came up to them and warned them not to continue down the road. He said there were drug addicts everywhere that would not hesitate to kill them and take their money. A bit concerned myself, I decided to stop and listen. After the guy’s spiel one of the women told him he was being ridiculous and to bugger off. It turns out he was a tour guide who did not like people walking through the old town without paying for his service, and was just using fear tactics to scare people into going with him. The assertive woman that told the man to leave has lived in Mombasa for 18 years, and the other two women she was with, a woman named Zelda and her college-aged daughter named Ariel, turned out to be the sister and niece of Sylvia, the Peace Corps medical officer for Kenya! It’s a small world and once I told them I was Peace Corps we hit it off well. We walked with the woman living in Mombasa down the perfectly safe road to her very nice house and she treated us to drinks and told us a bit about her project working with orphan children and drug addicts. She then excused herself and I spent the rest of the day with Zelda, Ariel, and the beanpole kid. The kid turned out to be a Sudanese refugee named Joseph who had escaped to Kenya. He lived at the airport for three months with nowhere to go and was taken care of by sympathetic airport employees. He was eventually found and assisted by Zelda, the sister of the Peace Corps Medical Officer. Zelda is married to an American Embassy guy and is living in Nairobi. She put Joseph into a secondary school in Nakuru where he is a star basketball player. He enjoys the sport because he claims it is so easy to dunk the ball, and starting up at the guy I have no reason to doubt it. He was the nicest kid and it breaks my heart to know how many similar cases are still stuck in the horrors of Southern Sudan.
At the recommendation of the woman from Mombasa we went to Heller Park, named after an environmentalist who 30 years ago converted an old gravel quarry into a game park. It was a nice hike and we saw plenty of Hippos, Buffalo, Snakes, and Crocodiles behind fencing as well as birds and monkeys everywhere. There was even a giant Galapagos turtle roaming around and I went for a ride on his shell. Afterwards, we went back to Mombasa for dinner and I took a terrifying Tuk-Tuk (three wheeled taxi) ride back to the PCV’s house to call it an evening. I have Zelda’s contact info now and a free place to stay the next time I am in Nairobi, so all in all things worked out pretty well.
The next day I left for Kilifi and to visit Soren, a PCV living on the coast. Soren is also working with the FAO but as a public health volunteer. He wanted to know more about farming as a business and how it can help the Kilifi Network farmers, and I was more than happy to meet up with a volunteer living on the coast. As soon as I arrived we piled into the back of a pickup truck and went to the field, and along the way we passed hundreds of small farms full of cashew nut and coconut trees. The coconut trees are over 50ft high and have notches cut into them, enabling a barefoot farmer to shimmy up to the top and throw coconuts to the ground below. There is also a tree here called the baobab and it is beautiful. They are ancient, grizzled trees with trunks that must be 15 feet across, and they are considered by many to be sacred. The field day was a bit low key compared to Kakamega, without as much singing and dancing, but it was a good experience, and I had a chance to fill myself with “madafu”, or fresh coconut milk. After our day in the field we went to a bar overlooking the crystal clear blue waters of the Indian Ocean, enjoyed a few drinks, and called it a night.
The following day was fantastic. Soren lives within walking distance of the beach and I laid out on the white sands and soaked up sunshine. It was low tide and I could walk into the sea for what seemed like miles without it ever becoming deep. Meanwhile I was able to look down and see sea urchins, brightly colored starfish, and an assortment of other sea animals that would be very bad to step on. I’m extremely tempted to get dive certified while I am here. We stopped for lunch at a resort hotel wanting 1500 shillings for a buffet lunch, but using Swahili we convinced the guy that we were not tourists we were able to eat for 500 shillings each, and the food was great. The price is negotiable for everything but a newspaper in this country. We went back to the beach and I read a book while a group of Kenyan women were standing nearby tenderizing an octopus by hurling it against a rock hundreds of times.
On Sunday we went back towards Mombasa and went to the public beach for a game of soccer. I then went into town to watch Pirates of the Carribean 2, a great movie, and went back to Kilifi for a great dinner too. I’m in the Kilifi FFS Network office now and I just finished a meeting with their network officials that went really well. Life on the coast is good.
posted by KenyaJoe at 7:28 AM
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