Month: July 2020

According to Oxfam ‘By the end of the year, 12,000 people per day are at risk of dying from COVID-19 linked hunger – potentially more than the disease itself.’

Which shows how vital it is to build up the capacity of the poor to grow their own food. 

Inga alley cropping is designed to prevent hunger, even during such crises when food distribution systems may break down. It enables the poorest farmers to feed themselves and their families, bringing the food right to where it is needed, while stopping the need to burn more rainforest to get fertile soil.  And once the Inga plot is established it keeps on producing year after year without the need for the addition of chemicals. 

Tall maize grown on previously degraded land in an Inga alley, Meangwe 2 village. Photo Linus Arong.

Close up of maize from Inga alley, Meangwe 2 village. Photo Linus Arong.

We have told you about the good work our overseas partners are doing.  They work hard for very little money, but they cannot work without some money, and we are running very low – running out in fact for some of our excellent projects. Some of you have already made donations and we are very grateful for that.  And some of you will not be able to afford any. But if you can, we would be very grateful for anything that you can give, be it a lot or only a very little. It all adds up. Thank you very much for your consideration. 

You can donate by PayPal on our website www.rainforestsaver.org

You don’t need a PayPal account, just a credit card. 

Or you can send a cheque made out to the Rainforest Saver Foundation to

The Rainforest Saver Foundation

33 Pentland View

Edinburgh

EH10 6PY

UK

Thank you very much. 

Other ways that you can support us without it costing you a penny.

Easyfundraising and Give as You Live

These are both ways to get online shops to donate to your favourite charity, which of course is us, whenever you shop in them without any extra cost to you. 

We registered RFS with Easyfundraising a few years ago and have collected £759 through them to date. Help us to double that

Easyfundraising is accessible via the link on our home page

1.      Go to www.rainforestsaver.org

2.      Scroll down to bottom left of the Home page (links are on other pages too)

3.      Under Easy Fund Raising click on ‘Click this link’ – and you’re there.

4.      You will see us on the right. Click on ‘Support this cause’ under our name and logo

5.      You will then be asked to either log in if you are already registered, or create an easy to set up free account

6.      You then select the shop you want to shop at from the many online shops that are listed on their website, and the shop makes the donation to us without charging you anything extra. Thank you very much.

Give as You Live. 

This is similar to Easyfundraising. We have only recently registered with them, so no takings to report yet. 

Go to the Give as You Live website

 and sign up for free and create your free account.  

Select  Rainforest Saver as the charity you want to support. Then  access the shops from the Give As You Live website  browse retailers like Marks & Spencer, Body Shop, John Lewis etc  before clicking the “shop and raise” button and shopping as normal. Once the retailer informs Give As You Live of the purchase, Give As You Live then emails you direct as a supporter advising you of how much you have raised.

The donations per individual shop may be small, but if we all do this it soon adds up.  We need every penny you can raise for us.  Thank you very much.

By Atanga Wilson Nebafor

I am very pleased to put forward my news on my Inga Alley cropping project, and how targeted farmers are responding to the project. As new communities are asking for the project to be taken to their communities, the older communities that started the project previously are increasing their Inga hedge rows and their Inga plot sizes, while other farmers are carrying out the pruning and Inga farm management themselves.

In my outreach I am training the new farmers on Inga Alley cropping and setting up nurseries which will be used to establish Inga Alley cropping plots.

Ntambu community training on Inga alley cropping, supported by International Rotary.  Note the A-frame in the back left corner. This is used for planting along the contours on a hillside to prevent erosion.

With slash and burn farming the farmers’ yields are sometimes good for the first year after clearing and burning the forest, but it is not always a good yield. The yields and the quality of the crop from the Inga plot after pruning is far better than in the first year after clearing and burning the forest.  In addition farmers have been able to grow different crops. Ngu Divine had never planted yams in the area where he established his Inga plot. But with the Inga he can now grow yams and they are growing very healthily. 

It is 10 times easier to plant Inga tree seedlings than to clear the same sized area of forest. Pruning Inga alleys is also easier because you are cutting Inga trees in hedge rows but in the forest you have other things to cut off as well. In Inga alley cropping there is no undergrowth once the Inga has covered the alley and is ready for pruning.

Inga Seedling ready for planting (Alori Community)

I am also conducting hands-on training to improve the farmers’ skill on Inga plot management.

Nibaba Community Inga Plot 1 year after planting

Pa Aldolfshu measuring his height with a 1 year Inga tree

The farmers talked of ‘the Inga tree as a wonderful tree that grows day and night’.

Mrs Elizabeth Inga farmers Munam Community

There are some insects attacking the Inga tree which need to be looked into. You can see their effect on the Inga leaves.

Cocoa cultivation is one of the major drivers of deforestation. Farmers of Buea (Muyuka, Yoke, Malende, Banga Bankundu, Bombe Bakundu and Balangi villages) turned to cacao farming since independence.  As the soil becomes degraded the cacao trees start dying. After about 15 year the cacao trees started dying because then there was no more soil fertility and no shade that the cacao tree needed.

When I started the Inga project I had to take some Inga seedlings to plant in cacao farms. This was to improve the lost soil fertility, provide shade and firewood that is used in the drying of cocoa beans. It has been shown that cacao under Inga grows better and faster,

Cacao farmer Julius Awah says that his cocoa trees were dying but after planting Inga in the cacao plot the cacao trees stopped dying and are growing very green now.

On the left healthy cocoa bush under Inga. On the right not as healthy cocoa without Inga. 

Inga provides the much needed fertile biomass for the cacao tree to grow better.

In total I am working with 125 farmers with Inga Alley cropping and 22 farmers with cacao and Inga in 13 villages of the South West and North West Regions of Cameroon.

Best Regards

Atanga Wilson Nebafor

Tel: 237 677812631/237660791262

Editor’s note

Mr. Atanga Wilson is one of our partners in Cameroon. He has been working with Rainforest Saver for several years as part of the Cameroon Inga Project.  He is based in Buea in SW Cameroon. He was trained to do Inga alley cropping by Mr. Gaston Bityo in 2016 with a grant from the Guernsey Overseas Aid Commission, and currently a lot of his work is supported by Rotary International.