Land of Maize and Honey

The Mziza club finished the year strong with a couple pales of honey. In the photo, Mr. Store and Japhet, the club chairmen and lead farmers, show off the harvest. Behind them, the AWP truck full of Maize. Farmers are paying back the input loans they received back in November. The truck will make 7 trips to collect all the maize.

 Close up, you can see the dark brood comb, which contains larvae. And under that, the white honey comb. After draining the honey, we will render the fatty wax into a useful block, from which candles or balms can be made. Farmers will earn about $5 per liter for their honey, making this harvest worth about $100-150.

The results are in on the maize harvest. Every farmer surpassed 600 kgs of maize for the year, which is the minimum for household food security. About half the farmers have twice that amount, and the average harvest was over 1,500 kilograms. In blue, the maize harvest using the AWP-loaned inputs. Any other maize produced is in yellow.