Millennium Villages Blog

In the cold morning air heavy with mist, green waves rise gently from deep valleys up to Ruhiira’s hilltops then flow downwards again, engulfing small villages. The soft waves of banana leaves are much more than just idyllic scenery for the inhabitants. They are their livelihood, and on the green fruit depends much of their well-being.

Ruhiira, a cluster of eight villages located in a lush area of Southwestern Uganda, is renowned for its bananas, matoke as they are called here. For the 50,000 villagers, this has been their staple food for generations. But years of intensive agriculture eroded the soil and reduced its fertility. The monoculture also had an impact on nutrition and left villagers suffering from vitamin deficiencies.

Grilled bananas for sale

But with the help of the Millennium Villages Project, Ruhiira’s population has been able not only to maintain its livelihood, but also to conserve the environment and boost its income.

Children hoping for some hot fruit

On the main square, a young man sells grilled bananas. Attracted by the aroma, children watch nearby, hoping that a buyer would toss them a hot fruit. Matoke is grilled, fried, mashed and eaten raw here. It is on the school feeding program menu, as well. The leaves and fibres have many uses, from roof thatching to creating delicate beads made into necklaces and bracelets. A women’s group making dried flowers from banana and maize by-products has just started.

Beads hang to dry at the community centre

But most importantly, thanks to bumper harvests, the banana market has contributed noticeably to higher income levels. With the help of mobile technology and two trucks provided by the MVP, farmers are now able to enquire about market prices in real time, then to send their produce to Kampala, where it’s sold on the market without the intervention of middlemen. Some thirty banana producer groups have also been formed, earning an estimated $200,000 yearly.

Anatoli Byamugisha is a member of one of them, the Kahurwa Matoke Group. With seven other men and seven women, they came together to improve their food security and household nutrition. And the results were well worth the effort.

A loaded banana truck ready to go to Kampala

‘Previously, a banana bunch weighed between 13kg and 25kg. Now it goes up to 32, 35kg,’ he says, his hand clasped on a mature fruit hanging from a tree. Improved agricultural techniques and the use of fertilizers led to a better yield, which in turn boosted income. Anatoli saw his shoot up from 20,000 shillings ($10) to 100,000 shillings ($50) per month.

With this, the middle-aged farmer and his colleagues were able to spread out their activity. They added cash crops like cardamom and beans that grow between banana trees, as well as fodder used to feed the improved zero grazing goats introduced by the MVP, and other nutrient rich vegetables. Not only do these crops allow farmers to have some additional much needed cash and diversify their diet but they also play an environmental role, as their roots prevent soil from being washed away by the rain on this hilly terrain. Other environmental measures are encouraged, like constructing erosion terraces and gullies in banana fields. More than 3,000 farmers have adopted them so far. Farmer groups were also given seedlings. To date, over 4 million tree seedlings have been planted. Since the 1950s, the area saw its tree cover plummet from 60% to less than 5%, but farmers are starting to understand that protecting this environment will help maintain their livelihood, as well as the breathtaking views of Ruhiira.

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