Hallo everybody,

Allow me to give a short introduction. I am Kim Visser and very recently joint the SuSanA network through my new position as a business adviser at WASTE, launching the SANITATION WINDOW: waste.nl/en/project/sanitation-window.

WASTE and Africa Interactive made a short movie about chemical vs natural fertilizers with case studies from Malawi for the purpose of awareness raising about the phosphorus shortage problem.

Please take a look and comment/ask/like/use...

vimeo.com/44461022

Kind regards,

Kim Visser

Hi Kim

Great video from Malawi comparing the use of organic and chemical fertilisers in Malawi.
Firstly I was wondering whether this video is also on youtube, as it would be great to add it to the SuSanA youtube list of favourites?

Secondly an open question that comes to my mind after watching the video:
Do you think that the use of chemical fertilizer will ever decrease in Malawi and be substituted by organic fertiliser?
As when one considers that the Malawian government has a budget line in the national budget for the chemical fertiliser subsidy programme and that this constitutes 13 to 15 % of the national budget according to the video, this represents clear institutionalisation of the use of chemical fertiliser in the Malawian agriculture sector.

Are there any indications that the subsidy for the chemical fertiliser programme will be decrease or withdrawn by the Malawian government in the future?

I would be very interested to have yours and others thoughts on these open questions.

Rgds
Trevor

Hi Trevor,

Sorry no youtube yet. Working on it, so I'll let you and SuSanA know when it is available.

To answer your second question... yes. WASTE is one of the parties that is quite busy raising awareness around the globe for this problem and the need to change policy. Because indeed there are challenges in this area, but as you can see in the movie... the world needs it!

This is mostly because of the fact that the whole picture should be financial sustainable. In some places it is the subsidy, in some places it is the production of some crops that is still higher with the use of chemical fertiliser than with the use of natural fertiliser, or the fertiliser made of human waste IS as good as the chemical ones but it is difficult to produce/handle/manage (separate urine, solid waste collection, upscaling problems).

But this will change soon... even the big chemical furtiliser production campanies are already putting a lot of money in research en development of natural fertiliser. And for example Mars is investing big numbers in this, for the use on their cacoa plantages. The Rabobank and the World Bank have just agreed on a consortium for the finance of the cacoa plattages in Ghana. Some examples of very promising developments are for example Safisana (Ghana) or Soil (Haiti).

This is just to give you an impression about the effort that is made in this field at this moment. Very simply, a the moment it costs money for governments to dispose the waste and furtilise the land. Why would they say no to make money of the waste and furtilise the land for free?

Rgds,

Kim

Hello,
I've seen the video of fertilizer problem in Malawi.
The solution is in how you make the organic fertilizer.
If you have an efficient system you will have more output than from chemical fertilizers.

Please contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Hi Richard,

Can you explain more about what you mean by make the fertilizer? Do you mean the way of processing and do you have any ideas about this, how to do it?

Rgds,

Kim