In 2011, from a small village of Bushara in Karama Sector of Nyagatare District, 12 farmers conceived an idea to advance maize farming after realizing the potential of the crop but with low productivity.
They started by organizing themselves in a farmer’s organization naming it KOHIIKA (Koperative Hinga Ikigori Karama). With no cooperative land, farmers used their small individual plots of land but were determined to increase productivity.
At the time many practiced intercropping and sometimes mixed cropping (Maize and beans of local varieties). Production of maize per hectare stood at 2 tonnes or less emanating from post harvest losses.
In bid to increase production and access stable markets, the cooperative in 2016 joined Farm to Market Alliance (FtMA), a platform established to bring benefit to all actors involved in the smallholder food sector with support from WFP.
Rwanda Development Organization (RDO) as one of the implementers of FtMA equipped the farmers with skills in good agricultural practices (GAP) and post harvest handling and storage (PHHS).
KOHIIKA was also able to receive coaching on governance and financial management from RABOBANK and training on saving groups from ICCOTERAFINA as part of capacity building from FtMA.
After receiving different trainings, they started putting into practice the skills learnt such as crop rotation, use of improved seeds and application of both mineral and organic fertilizers. This led to increase in yields, today maize harvests stand at 7 tons per hectare and there is hope to continue increasing in the coming seasons when other factors remain constant such as climate change.
The president of the cooperative emphasizes that the skills, technical support and advice from RDO helps them to ensure production keeps increasing which will eventually improve livelihood of members and development in general.
The support of FtMA through RDO has significantly supported KOHIKA’s vision, apart from yield increase, the cooperative’s income has gone up which helps them achieve some of the following results;
- Cooperative members have increase to 47 members, 22 men and 25 women.
- The cooperative built its headquarters with a conference room and an office that is fully equipped with all office equipments such as furniture, computer, printer and television among others.
- In 2017, they bought a house worthy Rwf5.3 million which helps in aggregation and storage of 60 tonnes.
- In 2019, with the support of PASP, they constructed a Rwf126 million warehouse with capacity of 1500 tonnes.
- Last year, the cooperative purchased a truck (Fuso) worthy Rwf44 million which is now used in aggregation and transportation activities.
- The cooperative has bought four (4) hectares of land and rents more than 100 hectares every season.
- KOHIKA is equipped with PHHS equipments such as moisture meter, weighing scale and shelling machines.
- Under its savings groups, they have reached at least Rwf12 million.
- KOHIIKA pays Ejo Heza pension for its members and intervenes in cases of emergencies to support members.
- Every member has the capacity to pay school fees for his/her child and health insurance of the family.
The president of KOHIIKA is grateful for the support from FtMA project as well as RDO for the continuous support, promising to continue using the skills members have acquired to increase productivity and improve livelihoods in general.
