Introduction

It had become a norm for smallholder farmers in Mudzi district that after harvesting their groundnuts they would struggle to get a remunerative market for their produce. In most cases, the farmers ended up selling their produce at very low prices to opportunistic buyers. The farmers were not organized implying that they lacked the capacity to negotiate with the buyers or store their produce until prices would become favorable. In addition, the farmers also did not have access to value addition options.

Dr Joseph Rusike, the N2Africa value chain specialist was in Nigeria 17th-30th July to conduct a rapid rural appraisal for legume value chain in the country. During this period, Dr Rusike met and interacted with a wide range of stakeholders in the country’s legume value chain. His survey carried him to some of the major cities within the moist savanna agro-ecological zone, such as Kano, Zaria, Kaduna, Jos, Makurdi and Abuja.

An important N2Africa milestone relating to dissemination activities is linking at least half of the participating communities to markets before the end of Year 2 (Milestone 4.3.3). In Kenya, we have undertaken this goal in a systematic manner. First the demand for soyabeans was assessed and likely buyers contacted. There are more than 40 companies in Kenya utilizing soyabean as an industrial raw material with national demand estimated at 150,000 tons per year and meeting part of this deficit offers an excellent market entry opportunity.

Click here for checklists in English and Swahili on “Best practices to maintain high yield and grain quality of soyabean”.

Click here for a useful document from the USA on the use of rhizobial inoculants.

Samson Foli, an MSc student of Wageningen University, The Netherlands, is in Kano, Nigeria on a working visit. He arrived Kano on 25th July and will be in the country up until 30th November. During his stay, Samson will conduct nutrient omission trials in greenhouse and field experiments to try to unravel the cause of non-responsiveness of soyabean to fertilisation especially of phosphorus. The study became necessary following observations of the problem in several N2Africa demonstration plots during the 2010 season.

An assessment of legume root nodulation by two grain legumes in response to inoculation and fertilizer source suggests that nodulation number, frequency of crown nodulation and the effectiveness of symbiosis may be controlled by crop management. Two grain legumes, climbing bean “Kenya Tamu” and soyabean SB19 were established at twelve locations in west Kenya. They were planted using different fertilizer and inocluation treatments and nodule production was scored after eight weeks.

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The N2Africa project sent out invitation to global inoculant manufacturers to tender for the supply of soyabean inoculants for the project’s research and development activities in 2011 and to consider establishing partnerships with local agro-dealers in all 8 N2Africa countries. This was done to ensure, that the project provides smallholder farmers with the best quality inoculants available.

Winning bids were selected based on offer of high quality products at the most cost-effective rates. The minimal conditions set for the bids were that the product to be supplied must:

Dr Bruce Knight of the legume Technology, UK, was in Zimbabwe on 26^th June-2^nd July 2011 to work with staff of the inoculant production plant at the Soil Productivity and Research Laboratory (SPRL), Marondera. Legume Technology Ltd is the producer of LegumeFix inoculants for various legume crops and Bruce was engaged by N2Africa as a consultant for his tremendous experience in the inoculant manufacturing industry.