Bosco Aredha’s two-acre citrus fruit farm in Makongeni Estate, Homa Bay is widely known by farmers in the lakeside county and even beyond.
The 40-year-old specialises in grafting, an agricultural practice whereby a shoot or scion of one plant is inserted into another forming one plant after the tissues fuse.
He learnt about the practice in 1999 while working with a non-governmental organisation tasked with integration of tree crops into the community.
When his contract with the organisation came to an end in 2006, Mr Aredha decided to use the skills he had acquired (fruit tree management, fruit tree propagation and disease and pest identification) to create employment.
He noticed that farmers in his home area faced difficulties when searching for good fruit tree strains and therefore decided to set up the grafting farm.
Using Sh65,000 from his savings, he purchased mango and orange seedlings, grafting tools, fenced the farm and also built a shade where the seedlings were placed.
Before his grafted fruits had grown to maturity, he relied on scions from other farmers.
His venture has been his main source of income over the last 10 years earning him at least Sh200,000 per month from the sale of grafted seedlings, each going at Sh200.
On several occasions, he receives large orders of from agriculture-based organisations, giving him a tidy sum of money.
Last year, for instance, an organisation mitigating the effects of hunger and malnutrition in Homa Bay bought 16,000 grafted fruit trees from him. The Sh320,000 return from this transaction saw him expand the farm as well as pay school fees for his children.
Mr Aredha grafts all sorts of fruit trees , but his highly sought after seedlings are those of mangoes. The Mango varieties found in his farm include ngowe, parvin, apple mango, chino and sebin vandyke.
“Grafted mangoes take a shorter period to produce fruits than ordinary ones. The practice is highly-recommended because farmers do not have to wait any longer for their fruits to mature. They will then be of higher quality thus fetch more money,” he said.
The following feature was first published in the Business Daily.
