Indigenous crops curb wildlife conflict, climate risk for Siaya farmers

For years, Reckadiuse Owino a farmer from Got Osimbo sublocation in Siaya County, watched without help monkeys destroy his crops season after season.

The invasion forced him to abandon his farm exposing his family to food insecurity.

Owino says the human wildlife conflict has intensified in the area as monkey raid their farms in search of food.

“People have cut trees along the river banks and the forests around this place forcing the monkeys to invade our farms and homestead in search of food. Planting maize has become so hard because of monkeys. You have to be in the farm from morning to evening to chase them away.

“If you can’t do that you can’t get any yield from the farm. They start with you from the day you plant; after weeding they eat the maize like sugarcane. The monkeys do not know when it is raining nor a weekend, they eat your crops. They destroy everything and if action is not taken, they are going to rend us food insecure,” said Owino.

However, Owino has found a solution in planting indigenous crops. Since he started planting indigenous crops such as finger millet, sorghum, and groundnuts, the conflict has significantly reduced.

In just a few weeks, his finger millet crop will be ready for harvest.

“It seems they are not aware that I planted, nature has not yet taught them, they have not eaten my crops. I have not camped in my farm to chase them, the way I used to do when I planted the hybrid maize,” noted Owino.

Beyond reducing the conflict of resources with wild animals, he notes that traditional crops are proving resilience with the change of weather patterns.

“Most farmers have gone back to the traditional production because of climate change. The crops are enduring climate shocks like short rains unlike the hybrid crops which require more rainfall,” added Owino.

He explained that farmers who planted indigenous crops in the last season harvested something with the shortened rainfall seasons, unlike those planted hybrid which requires more rainfall.

“In the past years we used to plant twice a year during the long rains of March and harvest in August and short rains from September to December. But we have noticed changing weather patterns from the year 2025 where the rains are starting then end along the way before the crops mature,” said Owino.

A few kilometres from here, Risper Agutu is bent over the scorching sun uprooting weeds in her farm in Maugo village, Got Osimbo location. She is expecting good harvest from her farm in a few months. After receiving training on climate-smart agriculture, she adopted indigenous farming practices that have transformed her harvests and strengthened her resilience to harsh climatic conditions.

“Before I used to get 20 kilograms of maize in my quarter an acre, but after training on climate resilience farming technologies, now I can harvest five bags of maize even when the rains are not sufficient,” said Risper.

When planting season arrives, she prepares a nursery bed for maize by mixing one wheelbarrow of compost manure with two wheelbarrows of soil then wait the seeds to germinate.  By the time she transplants the maize to her farm she is certain that they will grow.

“I plant a maize seed in each of the container and ensure they germinate. During the time of transplant, I ensure the roots are in good condition. And after 27 days I cultivate the crops and now I use the urine from my cows and goats as my organic manure for top dressing,” says Risper. 

To safeguard traditional crop varieties from extinction, the Got Osimbo community established a seed bank and gene bank with support from development partners.

Lawrence Odipo, a recorder keeper at Got Osimbo seed bank says the main reason they started this initiative was to preserve the indigenous seeds and cultural heritage.

They store dry seeds in the seed bank and plants that cannot produce dry seeds in a gene bank.

“We were first trained as farmers by GIZ organization on climate smart agriculture on seed technology banking and with support of other partners, we started the seed bank project,” added Odipo.

In the seed bank they keep variety of indigenous seeds like sorghum, finger millet, maize, ground nuts, vegetables, cassava, yams among others.

“With the climate conditions we are experiencing, the rainfall patterns have changed and sometimes the rains come when the farmers are not ready with fertilizers and seeds to plant making them plant late and yield less because the rains are not predictable. We felt that it is good we have the seeds kept to enable us plant on time,” noted Odipo.

Got Osimbo community has about 200 members where members get seeds on loan and after yielding, they take back twice what they borrowed.

The department of Agriculture in Siaya county is encouraging farmers to plant crops that will yield more and are more resilience to the climate changes.

“We encourage farmers if there is a seedbank in a community, they use those seeds because their moisture content and germination ability are tested before storing the seeds,” said Loise Olwada, Agricultural officer Ugunja Sub-county.

Loise noted that they have been training farmers on weather patterns and advising them on what, where, when and how to plant.

“Climate change is affecting farmers especially change in rainfall pattern and drought. Whenever there are search problems we do capacity building to our farmers on seed selection, smart farming technologies, advise on when to plant and fertilisers to use for better yields,” said Loise.

“Our work is to catalyse action towards more resilient societies. We have seen changes in the recent past because of climate change. We have seen increase in the disease outbreaks like Ebola and resource related conflict because people have to look for pasture in other areas,” said Aluso.

He adds that community level innovations are very important to be amplified, asking the government to provide supportive laws including extensions services to provide enabling legal environment and not to come up with prohibiting laws or regulations

As climate change continues to disrupt traditional farming systems, the experience of farmers in Got Osimbo demonstrates how indigenous knowledge and locally adapted crops can provide practical solutions to food insecurity, environmental challenges and human-wildlife conflict.