Farming school will help African communities
I’m coming to America. Actually, I’ve already arrived — I got here in the middle of August — and I’ve come twice before, leaving my farm in Zimbabwe and flying across the ocean to meet other farmers and share my story.
This time, however, I’m going to stay for more than a few days. I’ll take a break from growing sorghum and spend the next two years earning a master’s degree in plant breeding, genetics and biotechnology from Michigan State University.
My goal is to get an education that will help me improve African agriculture, presently dominated by smallholder farmers who produce about 80 percent of the food that our fellow Africans eat. In my village — it’s called Chikombedzi — women do most of the hard work in the fields, planting and weeding and harvesting to produce for themselves, their families and maybe a little bit extra.
CIFOR