The objective of the contest is to identify locally
developed farmer innovations which can complement existing extension
packages after further scientific evaluation. Local innovations have the
advantage that they are generally adapted to the conditions in which a
farmer operates. Therefore, they are likely to be easily adopted by
fellow farmers.
How Bukari Hassan tackled his termite problem
This year’s regional winner of the Farmer Innovation
Contest in Upper East Ghana tackled a termite problem by luring
carnivore ants as a natural deterrent for termites. Termites used to
kill Bukari Hassan’s young tree seedlings until he started to lure what
he refers to as ‘Tiger Ants’ using bones – left-overs from the butcher
or his own family’s meals. The ants feast on the bones and scare the
termites away allowing his trees to grow until they are strong enough to
defend themselves. This way Mr. Hassan managed to solve his number one
problem of growing trees. Meanwhile he has established a small forest
with trees that provide him with fruit, nuts, medicine, firewood and
timber. This is good news for Upper East Ghana, where tree cover
generally decreases. Mr. Hassan was awarded a motorcycle.
Co-awardees
Together with Mr. Hassan, eight other farmer
innovators in Upper East Ghana received district awards (water pumps or
house roofing sheets, each with an approximate value of 200 Euros). They
all found new ways to address pressing problems such as poultry and
other livestock diseases, pest infestations of grains during storage, or
limited accessibility of materials for the intensification of
production.
Laudatio
In his speech on Farmer’s Day on December 6, 2013,
Dr. Tobias Wünscher, ZEF senior researcher and coordinator of the
contest stressed that “our winners provide clear evidence that farmers
are more than adopters of externally developed technologies. They
develop their own solutions for their very own problems with the limited
resources that are available to them – this is what makes these
innovations so special“!
There will be at least two more rounds of the contest in 2014 and 2015.
Contact: Tobias Wünscher