Production Unit
KATC has a commercial production unit to support practical training and income generation. The production unit includes dairy and ranch animals as well as rain fed and irrigated crops. KATC, through the production unit is also involved in seed production and multiplication to ensure easy access to improved planting material for small scale farmers.
KATC has a commercial production unit to support practical training and income generation. The production unit includes dairy and ranch animals as well as rain fed and irrigated crops. KATC, through the production unit is also involved in seed production and multiplication to ensure easy access to improved planting material for small scale farmers.
Livestock Section
The livestock sub-section has close to 200 cattle consisting of dairy and beef herds.The dairy herd has 40 cows and 104 young stock. These include Friesian crosses, Jersey crosses and Boran crosses. All these breeds are off-springs of bulls under natural breeding. Currently, the sub-section is now breeding with Fleckvieh and Jersey bulls under artificial insemination. With the Fleckvieh the aim is to breed dual purpose females with good milk production and longevity as well as males which put on good weights from farm-grown feed.
The livestock sub-section has close to 200 cattle consisting of dairy and beef herds.The dairy herd has 40 cows and 104 young stock. These include Friesian crosses, Jersey crosses and Boran crosses. All these breeds are off-springs of bulls under natural breeding. Currently, the sub-section is now breeding with Fleckvieh and Jersey bulls under artificial insemination. With the Fleckvieh the aim is to breed dual purpose females with good milk production and longevity as well as males which put on good weights from farm-grown feed.
All the animals are grazed on natural pastures during the rainy season and on irrigated pasture during the dry season. The irrigated pasture is a mixture of natural grass and lucerne. The dairy cows are also fed with fresh lucaena and comfrey mixed in a concentrate. The concentrate comprises of a mixture of the following ingredients: organically grown oats, No 3 meal, maize bran, salt, mono-calcium phosphate (MCP), limestone flour and molasses. Hay is also fed to all the cattle. Currently 32 cows are in milk. The milk is supplied to Parmalat and to local communities.The beef herd has 20 cows, 35 young stock and two jersey bulls that move with the herd throughout the year. However, there is a plan to start artificial insemination with the beef herd as well.In the rainy season, the beef animals are grazed in a mob grazing system. This system helps in the improvement of the pasture quality as animals eat both the good and poor quality grasses. This helps to prevent the deterioration of the pasture over time. In the dry season, starting from July to mid-December, the animals are fed on a ration in the paddocks until there is enough grass from the rains. The beef ration consists of oats, soya stovers, monkey bread (musekese pods), salt and occasionally molasses. Hay and straw are fed adlib.
In addition to proper feeding, the animals are kept healthy through the use of preventative measures such as dipping, vaccinations and deworming. Although the livestock sub-section is not certified organic, efforts are made to keep the use of antibiotics to a minimum level. Antibiotics are only used when the disease is life threatening. In addition to the dairy and beef cattle, the livestock sub-section also runs of a small animal village, which is basically a collection of different small animals such as chickens, ducks, rabbits, pigeons, guinea fowls, etc. The small animal village serves as an educative demonstration to small scale farmers on how to raise a mixture of different animals that could contribute to household income and nutrition. More importantly, the rearing of many different species of livestock in one place permits the farmer to easily collect animal manure which is an important resource for the production of crops.The livestock sub-section is headed by one professional staff with the assistance of a volunteer. There are 12 general workers who carry out tasks ranging from milking, feeding, herding, etc.
Crop Section
- The crop sub-section of KATC’s Production Units section produces a wide variety of both rain-fed and irrigated crops on a commercial scale. These crops include both irrigated and rain-fed. Crops produced under irrigation are mostly cereals such as barley, wheat, oat and winter maize. Rain-fed crops include seed maize (mostly open pollinated varieties), soya beans, sunflower and green manure crops such as sunnhemp and velvet beans. Rhodes grass and lucerne are the main pasture species grown for the livestock sub-section.
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- Crop protection is mainly done through the use of cultural practices such as crop rotations and the use hedge rows that attract natural pest enemies to the fields. Under extreme pest and/or disease prevalence, botanical extracts are used to control crop pests and diseases.
- The sale of the crop produce is open to both retail and commercial clients. Currently, there is very little processing of most of the produce from the Production Units. It is, however planned that in the near future processed products such as semolina, stone-ground wheat flour, sunflower oil and soya-beans oil will be available for both retail and wholesale markets.