Farmer abandons maize, wheat for her passion

Uasin Gishu County is known for maize and wheat farming. For Ms Alice Rono, however, passion fruit farming is her fulfilment.
She says it is a lucrative business that requires little capital investment but gives high returns with minimal management.
“I used to plant maize and wheat but the production was low such that we only used it for subsistence farming, but since I ventured into passion fruit farming, I have been generating income week in week out all year round without regret” says Alice.
Ms Rono who abandoned maize and wheat farming to focus on passion fruit on her two-acre farm in Moiben, Uasin Gishu County 21 years ago, has never looked back.
She sells the fruits to a local company, Equatorial Horti Fresh Limited that exports them to Uganda, Europe and other foreign markets.

SIX-ACRE FARM

“I started growing passion fruits in 1997 on a very small piece of land after I noticed that it is very profitable since the crop takes six to eight months to mature and you get your returns,” said Ms Rono when the Nation team visited her farm during a field day.
Ms Rono, who is also a nominated MCA in Uasin Gishu County Assembly representing gender, has introduced her neighbours too, to the crop. Her six-acre farm is subdivided into smaller portions with two acres for passion fruit, one acre for coffee and the rest is used for traditional vegetables.
“I sell one kg of the fruit for between Sh80 and Sh100, which is more profitable than maize.
“Since I harvest weekly, I make about Sh100, 000 which enables me to cater for my personal needs, pay the five employees on my farm and pay for my children school fees,” she explained.
Her main challenge, she says, is lack of reliable water. She relies on water from a well to grow the purple and sweet yellow varieties of passion fruit, which fortunately do well even during long dry spells.
“Without water, I cannot get quality fruits. I use about 20,000 litres that costs around Sh15,000 per week. I would wish to do drip irrigation moving forward because with this, I will not incur much costs,” said Ms Rono.

A section of Ms Alice Rono's two-acre passion fruit farm in Moiben, Uasin Gishu County. Alice earns Sh100,000 per week from the fruits. DENNIS LUBANGA/ NATION MEDIA GROUP

She urges other farmers to consider diversifying instead of relying on a single crop throughout.
“Planting crops like maize and beans is not bad. One can, however, subdivide their land and plant horticultural produce too,” she notes.
She has petitioned the county government to consider setting up a passion fruit processing factory that can enable the farmers earn from value addition.
“Currently, we depend on factories in Uganda to process our produce,” she says.

DIVERSIFY CROPS

Ziwa Ward MCA Joseph Korir lauds his colleague for encouraging other farmers, especially women to venture into passion fruit farming.
“We want to tell our farmers not to depend on one variety of crop. They should diversify to crops that mature within a short period,” explains the local Ward representative.
Equatorial Horti Fresh Limited Director Moses Keitany says passion fruit farming is an important venture in the county.
“We are happy our leaders are leading from the front. We have a big market for passion in and outside the country because we have a huge deficit for the crop,” says Mr Keitany.
He indicates that previously, they sold one kilo of passion at Sh30 but the cost has risen to Sh100.
“With a good strategy, a passion fruit is likely to make over Sh1.2 million annually. Our farmers need to diversify as a result. Someone who plants maize has to do it in large quantities to match that who has planted passion,” says the director.
He urges farmers to join cooperatives and social welfare groups to benefit from their services even as he raises a red flag over the use of wrong pesticides.
“According to Mr Keitany, the Ugandan market has a deficit of 50 million tonnes of passion fruit a week, while Belgium needs one tonne per week.
“The government should ensure our farmers use modern irrigation systems for us (buyers) to get quality fruits,” explains the director whose company operates in six counties namely; Uasin Gishu, Elgeyo Marakwet, Nandi, Trans Nzoia, Kakamega and Bungoma.