From low-yields to high-yields

COMACO targets relatively unskilled farmers and offers them a chance to learn better farming skills and to have access to better paying markets, provided they organize themselves into farmer groups, achieve food security and support land use practices that reduce threats to wildlife and other important renewable resources. The table below summarizes results from a COMACO initiative called "food-for-better-farming", in which selected farmers received three 50kg bags of World Food Program maize in exchange for their compliance to undertake a 2 week course in conservation farming and composting, to apply these skills, to form farmer groups and to abide by conservation by-laws, including the surrendering of snares and illegal firearms

Food security results of the ?food-for-better-farming? initiative
Year	Total farmers per year	Total assessed per year		Total conservation farmers from those assessed	Total h/holds composting from those assessed	% food secure from those assessed	Total farmer groups cumulative
2001-02	2,434	1,584	961		0	30%	102
2002-03	5,574	2,697	2,176		1,899	68%	371
2003-04	8,621	2,379	1,414		1,373	48%	491

Households are given only one chance to benefit from this program so that new families can join the program. On average, about 50% become food secure during their first and almost all improve in food production. Over 50% learn and practice composting as a way of producing a local source of fertilizer from wildlife manure and other components. Data below show that second year participants continued to practice conservation though they were not eligible for WFP maize.

Conservation farming compliance by second-year participants (data available from Lundazi at time of writing this report)
District	Total sample from 2002/2003	Total CF farmers 2003/2004 season	Total compost 2003/2004 season	Total food secure 2003/2004 season
Lundazi	1,250	79%	85%	68%

Community meetings sensitize farmer group members and their leaders about COMACO and the importance to apply their new farming skills and to comply with program conditions to gain access to better market prices for such crops as rice, groundnuts and soybeans. Food security is the first step in the process. Community trainers work with group members to reinforce skills, assess compliance and evaluate crop harvests. They provide a critical link between COMACO and community understanding about the program.

COMACO works closely with District Agricultural Officers through the coordination and leadership of its own technical extension staff, headed by a regional agricultural coordinator, to help provide the improved training services needed to build farmer confidence in becoming self-reliance in food production. Throughout the process, the message to farmers is clear: by becoming better farmers, they can also become wildlife producers. COMACO is now entering its fourth year of farmer skills support and total number of farmers assisted exceeds 20,000 and covers six districts in areas of high wildlife and watershed value.