Crab and fish farming in Mtondoni

By Ngumbao Kithi

Any intervention to the looming food shortage and crippling economy is welcome.

Kwetu Training Centre, a non-governmental organisation, has come up with cheap and sustainable methods to produce and conserve food using natural resources.

The organisation trains villagers at Mtomondoni in Mtwapa to stop mangrove harvesting and instead raise mangrove seedlings and to venture into crab and fish farming.

So far, the villagers have reclaimed more than two acres of bare beach land into crab and fish farms.

The local people have also acquired knowledge in food and fruit processing and bee keeping without using machines but natural resources.

The Centre itself uses solar power only as there is no electricity. It also uses borehole water.

Further, the Centre has come up with solar driers to dry up mangoes in order to increase their shelf life.

The sustainable method of conservation has made crabs, fish, honey and Neem products the most sought after at the Coast.

The activities of the Centre have attracted the United Nations Development Programme, which has awarded Kwetu Training Centre for its outstanding effort in helping the community reduce poverty through sustainable use of natural resources.

Sustainable Development

The Centre received $5,000 and a certificate from UNDP during a congress in Spain in October last year. David Obura, a board member at Kwetu, says his organisation beat four other entries from Africa to win the Equator prize, which was presented to Kwetu on October 6 in Bacerlona.

The Equator prize recognises and celebrates outstanding community efforts to reduce poverty through the conservation of biodiversity.

The Centre got the prize for its organic farming and bee keeping, food processong and for training the poor on adding value and extending the shelf life of fruits and vegetables.

Obura says the training centre, which specialises in community programmes to assist in sustainable development, had laid the foundation for a global movement of local successes that are collectively making positive contributions towards achieving the Millenium Development Goals.

Neem Processing

Rather than cutting down mangroves, the Centre’s mariculture research is conducting unique ways of providing renewable sources of income through cultivating crabs and prawns.

Other items made by the Centre include Neem processing herbal products and remedies from the Neem tree, a natural and renewable resource.