Meet the young farmers (1)
24-09-2018From 6 to 15 October Agriterra welcomes a group of 9 young farmers from 8 different countries. They are coming to The Netherlands for a study tour visit. Goal of the program is to strengthen and develop personal leadership of the (to be) leaders within the agrifood system.
The coming two weeks we will introduce the participants of the studytour, starting with Alice Abigitije (27), Aung Kyaw Moe (29) and Crescent Mugisha (28).
Alice Abigitije (27), Rwanda
At the age of seven, Alice asked her parents for a small piece of land and started to cultivate it. With the savings from her farming activities, she eventually bought her own land. When she was 22, Alice started her university studies and at the same time joined an agricultural cooperative. As she was born, growing up and working in a farmer’s society, farming became her passion and currently she is a cooperative manager at a horticulture cooperative called KAIDU.
“Working with farmers helped me to open my mind and right now I encourage young people especially women and girls to join agricultural cooperatives”.
Aung Kyaw Moe (29), Myanmar
Coming from a family of farmers, Aung did not have access to good education. He begged his parents to send him to school and as a result he completed university education in the city. During school breaks he worked as a farmer in the paddy fields to support his school fee. “I quickly learned that farmers gained very little profit from farming because of high operation costs. Since then, I became interested in rural development and improving farmers’ living conditions”.
Aung is currently working at Proximity Designs, a social enterprise that develops and sells irrigation products and agricultural services for smallholder farmers.
Aung is currently working at Proximity Designs, a social enterprise that develops and sells irrigation products and agricultural services for smallholder farmers.
Crescent Mugisha (28), Uganda
Crescent is a young man from Uganda, who describes himself as a “youth economic empowerment activist”. He is managing his own commercial poultry, piggery and apple farm. At his savings and credit cooperative Rukiga SACCO he is the chairperson of the youth council. Besides, he still finds time to function as a chairperson of Kigezi Potato Farmers Cooperative Society. Crescent employs two people at his farm and “the time I enjoy most is when I am physically engaged in farming activities”.
