Sustainable World Radio: Friday mornings at 9-10 am PST on KCSB 91.9 FM in Santa Barbara, California and streaming live on www.kcsb.org. Program will be posted later on   www.sustainableworldradio.com, or www.radio4all.net 


Join Jill Cloutier of Sustainable World Radio on Friday July 11, for an interview  with Peter Murage founder and Director of Mount Kenya Organic Farming (MOOF).  Peter is a Permaculture teacher and designer who founded the (NGO) MOOF in 1999, after taking a Permaculture Design course in England with Patrick Whitefield.  MOOF is a farm and demonstration/training center for smallholder farmers, located near Nanyuki, Kenya on western slope of Mount Kenya. The MOOF Center was designed as a Permaculture Design Diploma Project and was initiated during a severe drought that lasted from 1997-2002.

Also joining Jill in the studio will be Wes Roe and Margie Bushman of the Santa Barbara Permaculture Network, who first met Peter Murage while in Brazil for the 8th International Permaculture Conference (IPC8).  Peter was one of a delegation of Africans attending the conference who made a successful bid to have the next International Permaculture Conference held in Africa in 2009 (IPC9, www.ipc9.org).


More Information:

Around 3.3 Million people were at risk of starvation during year 2000 drought in Kenya. Yet those adopting some organic methods like soil management practices which help to retain moisture had a greater success story for their crops. This increased MOOF determination to train farmers in food self sufficiency through organic agriculture and simple methods of water and soil conservation.

Peter has been among the first black Kenyans to facilitate smallholder farmers group to undergo international group organic certification with an international certification body. He has participated in formulating the East African Organic Standards, OSEA launched May 2007. The main emphasis of MOOF Programme is the facilitation of smallholder producer groups in the production of enough food for themselves and the community and production and marketing of specialty high value certified organic products. MOOF’s main goal is to “Tackle Poverty among Smallholder Farmers through Organic Trade”.

To help support MOOF with donations and more contact:
Mr. Peter Murage
Programme Director,
Mount Kenya Organic Farming ( MOOF.AFRICA)
P.O. Box 1053-10400, Nanyuki ­ Kenya.
Cell: +254-733664103
Office: +254- 6231187
Email: moofafrica@todays.co.ke


ARTICLES ON MOOF:

To get a deeper understanding of the amazing work with rural communities on western slopes of Mt Kenya

TACKLING POVERTY AND FOOD INSECURITY AMONG
SMALLHOLDER FARMERS THROUGH ORGANIC TRADE

http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:o9-Ym-yiPeMJ:www.unep-unctad.org/cbtf/events/arusha/MOOF%2520Africa.pdf+MOOF+Kenya&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=4&gl=us

Paper Presented during the Regional Workshop on “ Promotion production and trading ,
opportunities for Organic Agriculture production in East Africa” 6th­9th March 2006
ARUSHA- TANZANIA


LOCAL ADAPTATION STRATEGIES ON CLIMATE CHANGE
(KIENI- EAST-KENYA) MOUNT KENYA ORGANIC FARMING (MOOF.AFRICA) IN PARTNERSHIP WITH BOTH ENDS

http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:as8XsePF1kYJ:www.bothends.org/service/casestudy_MOOF.pdf+MOOF+Kenya&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=8&gl=us


EarthOil Project:

Earthoil’s African arm ­ Earthoil Kenya, http://www.earthoil.com/3398 in partnership with MOOF AFRICA (Mount Kenya Organic Farming) is working with smallholder farmers in the Nanyuki region of Kenya to help in the production of various high-value organic horticultural crops. MOOF AFRICA is a non-profit making national NGO, which seeks to promote the acceptance and implementation of sustainable, external low input farming systems. They do this through result oriented training, on-farm research and interactive participation of smallholder farmers ­ in the process highlighting these methods as viable options in increasing food production and alleviating poverty among the resource poor smallholder farmers in the rural areas of Kenya.

Earthoil plans to start with a pilot smallholder farmer group ­ ensuring they receive effective supervision and monitoring. This group is then proposed to initially expand to 400 farmers - each with 1 acre in which various high value organic oil crops - borage, high-oleic safflower, evening primrose and moringa - will be grown. The crops will be irrigated through the farmers’ access to perennial rivers whose source is the Mount Kenya watershed. Once harvested, these seeds will then be sold to Earthoil at a fair and sustainable price, for processing.

The targeted total acreage under organic crop production will be 400 acres. This will gradually increase to involve more smallholder farmers and organic producer groups in the Nanyuki region to target 2000 smallholder farmers ­ and later 8000 smallholder farmers - as the project expands to cover more districts in the Mount Kenya region.

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