The Sasakawa Africa Association (SAA)-Ethiopia, through its Capacity building initiative sponsored two mid-career students from Mekelle University (MU) to implement their Supervised Enterprise Projects (SEPs) at Haregu Gobezay’s horticultural farm in MayWoyni Kebele, Rama Adiarbe’ate District, Tigray region.

Haregu, 46-year-old farmer, wife and a mother of six, began transforming her rocky land in 2005/06 by transporting fertile soil from a nearby river deposit and planting grafted apple mango seedlings.

A few years later, SAA SEPs interns, Birhane Gedamu and Alganesh Gebreselama, identified gaps in Haregu‘s farming practices through a needs assessment. Living in the same kebele, they provided hands-on support in grafting techniques, organic fertilization, crop protection, farm management and other good agricultural practices (GAPs). With their guidance, she started producing compost and vermi-compost in 59 pits and applied it to her field. This resulted in an annal harvest of 1,500 quintals of fruits.

Haregu's fruit grafting site

Despite setbacks caused by the conflict in the region and Covid-19, Haregu has earned approximately 40 million birr ($ 931,453) since 2019 from selling 500 MT of mango, 7.5 MT of avocado, 25.0 MT of banana, 25.0 MT of orange and 0.5 MT of papaya from her rehabilitated 12.5 ha farm.  

Her success has enabled her to build three homes, a car and a hotel in the district, and a villa in Mekelle. Her farm has now become a demonstration site for farmers, researchers, experts, lecturers, and investors, showcasing organic and climate-resilient farming practices.  In addition to horticulture, Haregu practices integrated farming with 14 dairy cows, a bull, 20 sheep, beekeeping, and a 100 egg-laying poultry. She is also producing 3000 mango rootstocks and 2000 grafted seedlings for sale under contract.

Haregu’s work not only improved her family’s income but also their nutrition. Her once abandoned and unproductive land is now thriving, demonstrating transformative power of eco-friendly farming innovations supported by SAA.