For African Farmers, One Backpack Holds Key for Survival

With an estimated 80 to 100 million small landholder farmers in East Africa and an additional 25 million in South Africa, sustainable farming methods are vital for survival.

After a year-and-a-half of working to build communal farms in Southern Sudan, Rachel Zedeck was “emotionally raw and physically exhausted.” But after a step back (and a quick vacation), Zedeck reassessed the situation and vowed to get down to the root causes of the Sub-Saharan food crisis: a lack of sustainable farming resources, resulting in poor crops and limited nutritional supplies.

Before this Kenyan family received the Backpack Farm, its crops were puny and brittle. But as a result of farming with the backpack's materials, the family now has lush, sustainable crops. Photo: Rachel Zadneck

In April 2009, Zedeck had assembled what she dubs her “wonder team” of agricultural experts. Together they created and launched the Backpack Farm Agriculture Program, an agriculture-based initiative that works from the ground up to promote income generation and human resources development.

In its first impact study (to be published in January), the group tested the program on 12 acres of production, including eight different high-nutrition crop varieties. These are produced under drip irrigation and nonmechanized, a practice in which Zedeck says mirrors rural farming techniques.

“Our first program had unbelievable but realistic results. I am really excited,” she says. “In less than four weeks we will be sharing these results with as many organizations as possible. I hope we can influence the design of other programs working in rural farming communities, no matter where they are in the world.”

Inside each carefully planned backpack, farmers will find drought-resistant seeds, a drip irrigation kit, plant nutrition in combination with eco-friendly chemistry, parathyroid-based Malaria pesticide (which is nontoxic), small farm tools, a 6-liter chemical sprayer, training manuals and a journal.

“By eliminating the need for traditional fertilizers, which damage soil and water tables, and distributing a cost-effective drip irrigation system and training on green water management (rainwater collection) techniques, we think the Backpack Farm model could actually shift the entire mindset of how to develop rural economies and make a positive impact Africa’s food security by empowering rural farmers with access to markets,” Zedeck says. “I know it doesn’t seem like such a big deal, but we developed an all-in-one package that should cost more than $5,000, [but] costs less than one-fifteenth [of that].”

While the backpack does include pesticides, Zedeck says in some conditions, the usage of chemicals in unavoidable. However, 85 percent of the materials are organic and only uses traditional pesticides when “absolutely necessary.”

“If we set up a grower’s co-op or out-grower scheme to grow for a commercial farm, they may be contracted to grow a crop that here in Africa would be impossible to protect without a traditional pesticide,” Zedeck explains. “I have been in South Sudan where locust are almost the size of my head. Swarms of them appear in minutes, destroying everything. Even when we need to recommend a traditional pesticide of some kind, we only recommend products which we believe can used in limited quantity.”

Early next year, Zedeck plans to launch the Backpack Farm Foundation, a separate program that will primarily focus on building more than 10,000 school gardens in Kenya over the next three years.