MHAC Programmes:
MHAC’s training programmes include a 2-year residential certificate course; 1-week workshops for farmers; and 6-weeks to 3-months short courses for community development practitioners from any country.
To date, more than 400 students have graduated from the MHAC two-year certificate program, and MHAC staff and graduates have trained over 100,000 rural farmers. Kenyan farmers who have benefited from training in GROW BIOINTENSIVE are able to improve productivity, generate income, and at the same time improve soil fertility. This is a major step to combating hunger and malnutrition.
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| "Best Practical Student" graduation 2006 |
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Mini-Training Centres:
In addition, MHAC has developed 27 Mini-Training Centres (MTCs) in village settings to extend these techniques to women's groups and farmers. Organized as community-based organizations, the MTCs are an approach that empowers farmers to be trainers of other farmers in their localities.
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MHAC Graduates:
MHAC estimates that well over 100 Kenyan NGOs have been started by its graduates to teach GROW BIOINTENSIVE practices and other related technologies aimed at sustainability.
In one example, GROW BIOINTENSIVE training for two MHAC graduates was multiplied through the Integrated Rural Community Empowerment Program (IRCEP) in Kenya to provide basic GROW BIOINTENSIVE training to over 540 people during a 4-year period. At the beginning of the training, most of these 540 farmers and their families could not grow enough food for three meals a day because of fertilizer and other artificial input costs. In economic terms, their family income amounted to less than zero. However, results of an on-farm follow-up survey conducted in the 5th year were dramatic. Farmers using GROW BIOINTENSIVE techniques were able to provide three nutritious meals per day for their families and generate, on average, $30 per month in income from excess crops sold at market.
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