Lime improves Kenya's maize harvest

Isaiah Esipisu in IPS: As the world’s worst food security crisis continues across the Horn of Africa, including in Kenya, some smallholder farmers in the western part of the country are still feeding their families with last year’s abundant harvest. This is thanks to an agricultural programme focusing on reviving the fertility of the soil in the region.



According to David Mbakaya, a soil scientist at the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI), early findings from on going research established that the soil in Western Province was too acidic for maize production due to climatic factors and the overuse of nitrogenous fertilisers. "From field trials we have discovered that the average Potential of Hydrogen (pH) levels in soil within the region stands at 4.5 – meaning that such soil can hardly support growing maize," said Mbakaya.



Scientifically, the neutral pH level, where it is neither acidic nor alkaline, is seven. Anything below seven is acidic, and above that is alkaline. However, maize can withstand mild acidity ranging from 5.5 to 6.5. Research scientists at KARI – Kakamega branch, with funding from the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, encouraged farmers to neutralise their soil using lime - a soil additive made from pulverised limestone or chalk. It is cheaply available in Kenya.



"I tried liming my land for two seasons, and the results are astounding," said Isaac Ochieng Okwanyi, a 29-year-old father of two who began farming after he was evicted from Nairobi’s Mathare slum in 2008 following the country’s post election violence….



Maize on a Mount Kenya farm, shot by CIAT, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license

GM corn being developed for fuel instead of food

Suzanne Goldenberg in the Guardian (UK): US farmers are growing the first corn plants genetically modified for the specific purpose of putting more ethanol in gas tanks rather than producing more food. Aid organisations warn the new GM corn could worsen a global food crisis exposed by the famine in Somalia by diverting more corn into energy production.



The food industry also opposes the new GM product because, although not inedible, it is unsuitable for use in the manufacture of food products that commonly use corn. Farmers growing corn for human consumption are also concerned about cross-contamination. The corn, developed by a branch of the Swiss pesticide firm Syngenta, contains an added gene for an enzyme (amylase) that speeds the breakdown of starches into ethanol. Ethanol plants normally have to add the enzyme to corn when making ethanol.



The Enogen-branded corn is being grown for the first time commercially on about 5,000 acres on the edge of America's corn belt in Kansas, following its approval by the US Department of Agriculture last February. In its promotional material Syngenta says it will allow farmers to produce more ethanol from the corn while using less energy and water.



Meanwhile, campaigners say the corn will heap pressure on global food supplies and contribute to environmental degradation. They argue Enogen will lead to an increase in the amount of food crops going to fuel, leaving less for human consumption and leading to food price rises. That will lead to food price rises on the global market. "The temptation to look at food as another form of fuel to use for the energy crisis will exacerbate the food crisis," said Todd Post of Bread for the World, a Christian anti-hunger organisation....



From the pre-GMO era, over time, selective breeding modifies teosinte's few fruitcases (left) into modern corn's rows of exposed kernels (right). Shot by John Doebley, from a PLoS One Journal, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Generic license