Main Project Objective
The main objective of this project is to promote broader adoption of proven climate smart agricultural technologies and good practices in agroecology and climate-smart agriculture among smallholder farmers in Kpamele, Badimuguru and Boatarigu communities in order to improve farmers? incomes, access to renewable energy, water, and food.
3.2 Specific Objectives
The specific objectives are to:
a. support smallholder women farmers to adopt technologies that combine agroecology farming with fish farming and animal rearing under simple irrigation system.
b. train households, commercial food vendors, cottage industry operators and institutions to adopt improved and efficient mud stoves for cooking and heating.
c. train and empower households in wildfire management and to transforms their domestic and farm wastes into compost to support organic agroecology for food security and sustainable incomes.
3.3 Project Implementation Strategy
This project seeks to build the capacities of rural communities especially women, food vendors, schools, and industry operators in and around the Nankpanduri to phase out to use of inefficient renewable energy systems in homes, schools, commercial areas, and industry to adopt efficient stoves that saves up to about 60% of the current energy use. The project will support household farmers in the preparation and application of organic fertilizer in agriculture and improve on simple irrigated land use efficiency and productivity The project will enhance the production of food, poultry, small ruminant rearing, fish farming, and vegetable cultivation within a safe environment.
The project will build strong commodity value chain linkages around vegetable and fish and poultry products-vegetable and fish marketing. It will increase the productivity of land and water resources effectively by integrating small irrigation, aquaponic and poultry. Vegetable-fish-poultry farming was one example of integrated-irrigation aquaculture (IIA)-a strategy to increase agricultural productivity from every drop of water while improving the financial sustainability of investments in irrigation. Vegetables, poultry, and fish are cultivated together on the same plot adjacent to each other and the by-products of one are used as inputs by the other.
The project will train 30 artisans in household energy efficient mud cookstoves; institutional cookstoves, commercial cookstoves and cottage industry (pito and shea butter) cookstoves. The trained artisans would be empowered to construct for the interested clients. For the commercial, institutional, and industrial operator, the project will provide the initial stove for free, but the subsequent ones would be subsidized and paid for by the users. The household cookstoves will be built for free and the women would be taught on the maintenance.
The project will build an enterprise made up of 20 farmers in vegetable-poultry-fish farming, through Farmer Field Schools (FFS) methods in Integrated Pest and Disease Management strategies. The fundamental activities are the preparation of irrigated vegetable fields downstream; the conversion of the irrigation ditches and farm ponds into aquaponic. The pond will be stuffed with catfish. The classic fry farming involved raising the fish from eggs to fingerlings and then transporting them to the main ponds. The fish are fed with poultry droppings and the vegetable waste. The poultry birds are fed with the vegetables and other farm waste mixed with dry fish (from the fishponds). The poultry droppings and the vegetable waste are used to feed the fish in the ponds. When the oxygen level of the water in the fishponds is low, the sludge is released into the vegetable farms to provide the needed liquid manure to the crops. The project will produce pesticides from the liquefied bird droppings mixed with Neem extracts to spray the vegetable farms. The farmers would be taught to raised waste pits to process waste into compost for organic farming.
The technologies to be adopted will ensure adequate supply of micronutrients which is the relative quantity of nutrient that is required for plant growth. It takes part in metabolic activities, enzymatic process/catalysts etc. Thus, these will directly and indirectly help in plant growth and development. There are eight (8) essential plant nutrient elements defined in this technology as micronutrients like boron (B), zinc (Zn), manganese (Mn), iron (Fe), copper (Cu), molybdenum (Mo), chlorine (Cl) and silicon (Si). They constitute in total less than 1% of the dry weight of most plants. Organic sources like farmyard manure, compost, vermicompost etc. may contain less quantity of these nutrients but presence of these help the plant in their growth and development. These trace elements or minor elements are required only in small amounts (5 to 200 ppm, or less than 0.02% dry weight).
The yield per ha from the irrigated vegetable will increase from 1.2-2 tons to 3-4.5 tons yielding a net return of US$2,400 per each planting season. In addition, US$1,800 would be obtained as net profit from the poultry whilst US$2,500 would be the net income from the fishpond. The project will permanently engage 30 women smallholder farmers to operate the compost preparation, organic farming, promotion of energy efficient cookstoves, poultry and aquaponic.

3.4 Expected Outputs
Output 1: 30 smallholder women farmers adopt technologies that combine agroecology farming with fish farming and animal rearing under simple irrigation system.
Output 2: 100 households, 20 commercial vendors and two institutions adopt improved and efficient mud stoves for cooking and heating.
Output 3: 30 households trained in wildfire management, and transformation of domestic and farm wastes into compost to support organic agroecology.
4. PROJECT ACTIVITIES

Output 1: 30 smallholder women farmers adopt technologies that combine agroecology farming with fish farming and animal rearing under simple irrigation system.

Planned Activities

4.1.1 Conduct preliminary consultation to form the Project Management Team. The PMT will inform the leadership of the three (3) communities and other relevant stakeholders in the District about the project. The Project Management Team will seek their involvement, participation, and full cooperation during project implementation.

4.1.2 Organize community sensitization to mobilize Women Farmers and network them.
This activity begins with community awareness creation on the integrated vegetable-poultry-fish farming system, introduction to organic farming, Neem extracts as pesticides. Interested women farmers would be registered, mobilized, and organized into farmer cooperatives, and groups for networking.

4.1.3 Establish Farmer Field School at Kpamele to build the capacity of the participants in integrated farming methods, aquaponic fish farming, small irrigation, neem seeds processing protocols ?collection, processing, storing, and marketing ? this activity centers on the training and supporting women to acquire needed skills in undertaking these activities.
4.1.4 Establish multi-stakeholder platform and training of members to support and promote integrated climate smart agriculture, neem trees protection, management, and advocacy to safe the neem tree and other indigenous trees in the local communities. This will involve key community members, i.e., chiefs, opinion leaders, women group leaders, youth groups leaders, farmer groups and relevant district authorities.
4.1.5 Build capacity of women in agribusiness management and money literacy ?this activity will build the women capacity to make vegetable farming, poultry, and fishing as a business. The women would receive skills in general business management, money literacy and other related areas.
4.1.6 Establish village saving and loans schemes VSLA ? this activity supports the women with training and tools to enable them start saving and start business on their own with business plans.

Output 2: 100 households, 20 commercial vendors and two institutions adopt improved and efficient mud stoves for cooking and heating.
Planned Activity
4.2.1 Identify, register, train and license and empower 30 artisans in different models of efficient mud cookstove construction.
4.2.2 Undertake public education on the need to shift to efficient renewable energy stoves.
4.2.3 Support household heads to construct domestic cookstoves, institutional cookstoves and industrial and educational cookstoves.
4.2.4 Support trained artisan to invest in mass production of domestic cookstoves, commercial and industrial cookstoves.

Output 3: 30 households trained in wildfire management, and transformation of domestic and farm wastes into compost to support organic agroecology.

Planned Activities
3.3.1 Identify, train and support 30 women farmers to invest in commercial production of compost utilizing domestic and farm waste and poultry waste.
3.3.2 Provide further training to the trained women in business management.
3.3.3 Provide start-up capital to help them begin the business.
3.3.4 Establish Commodity Value Chain Linkages around vegetable and fish and poultry products. This will be done by operationalizing market information, profiling buyers and marketing organizations and facilitating formation of processing groups.