"This project has really taken us far"
An update from the Hidden Entrepreneur appeal:
Gladys Gathoni, farming entrepreneur, Meru County, Kenya
Photo: Traidcraft Exchange/Ian Gatere
Back in 2018, we launched the Hidden Entrepreneur appeal – where your donations were doubled by the UK Government to help people in low-income countries build businesses and create a better future for their families and communities.
Four years later, we now want to share just what that appeal – and your generous support – has meant to communities in Meru County, Kenya.
The region faces many challenges – the increasingly fragile climate is prone to severe droughts and because farmers are so isolated, it’s difficult to get the training, seeds and routes to market that are fundamental to a successful farming business.
At the heart of all of these challenges are farmers like Gladys. When we started working with her, she already demonstrated the drive and commitment central to the Hidden Entrepreneur appeal. She said…
“If I have a lot of work to do, I just have to stretch myself, I just have to work a little harder every day to get all the work done.”
Your donations – matched pound for pound by the UK government – supported amazing people like Gladys, who have all the talent and determination needed to succeed in business – they just needed the opportunity to get started.
Gladys and Julius Mwangi Maina, a trainer with the project
Photo: Traidcraft Exchange/Ian Gatere
When we caught up with Gladys in 2019, she expressed her hopes for what she could achieve with the help of the project:
“I hope that if we come together as farmers, we will be uplifted. I’m hoping that it will be easier to get seeds because we are working together and easier to find a market with a good price.”
Almost 3 years later, she has gained even more from the project than she predicted:
“[This project] has trained us on many sound farming practices, but the time we were trained using the demonstration farms was the time they really helped us.
That is where we saw spacing, how to cover nursery beds. We knew nothing about nursery beds! Nothing about the right crop-protection products to use!”
Because they live and work so remotely, local farmers like Gladys are dependent on middlemen to get their crops to market. These middlemen consistently undervalued their produce.
The Hidden Entrepreneurs project – which recently came to an end - has helped to shift this imbalance by sending market price updates to farmers via SMS messages. As Gladys says…
“You can negotiate as you know what the price in the market is. It really helps. You can tell him, no, in Isiolo it is at this price, in Meru it is this much,”
Gladys Gathoni’s farm ledger book
Photo: Traidcraft Exchange/Ian Gatere
The project has not been smooth sailing all the way – Covid-19 made it impossible for farmers to meet for many months and caused vegetable prices to hit record lows. But through it all, farmers like Gladys have shown the drive and determination to meet these challenges head on – with your support they are working for a better future for their families and communities.
When we caught up with Gladys in 2021, despite all the challenges of the pandemic, she said this…
“This project has really taken us far. My yields have gone up.”
As we look ahead, challenges in this region will remain, but thanks to your support there are thousands of farmers who are better equipped to use their skills to create a better future for their families and communities.
Our work in this region will continue, but today we wanted to stop and say thank you for supporting the Hidden Entrepreneur appeal – the difference has been life-changing.
