Six years ago when Gilbert Atsiaya, armed with a bucket and a jembe started to grow vegetables on a piece of land condemned as unproductive, the neighbours laughed him off. Even the village young men who wasted much of their valuable time sitting on bus-stops waiting to carry luggage for people or beg for handouts from people arriving from towns, dismissed his efforts as a non-starter.

Even the village young men who wasted much of their valuable time sitting on bus-stops waiting to carry luggage for people or beg for handouts from people arriving from towns, dismissed his efforts as a non-starter.

But Atsiaya, who hails from Ebwali village, Emuhaya division, Vihiga District, was determined to prove them wrong. He tilled one acre of the land where he planted over 400 seedlings of kales. 

Every morning and evening, he could be seen tirelessly spending two to three hours watering his crop. Despite his determination, the first harvest was not very good, resulting in huge losses. 

Those who had dismissed his initiative felt relieved, having been vindicated by the poor harvest he recorded. 

This however did not kill his spirit. He borrowed money from a cooperative society and invested again in the venture. He was not wrong this time around. 

A few months after he grew his second set of Kale seedlings, a dry spell fell over the land. He employed several young men who watered the vegetables three times a day. 

As weeks passed, his crop flourished as those of his neighbours withered.  His farm was the only one with green vegetables growing vibrantly. 

With the worsening drought, the villagers became desperate. They started streaming slowly to his farm, even those who had initially dismissed his business as a non-starter. 

“Money from the villagers wasn’t much. We were only fortunate when boarding schools started to give us orders to supply them with the vegetables,” Atsiaya recalls. 

High schools like Bunyore Girls, Mudavadi Girls, and Ibubi Girls, are some of the schools that continue to give him regular orders for which they pay handsomely. 

As the demand grew, so did his business. From one acre of land, he expanded the area being planted with vegetables to two half acres. 

The number of people he employed to work on the land also increased from 10 to 20. For the last three years, his farming has grown by leaps and bounds. He has managed to purchase a generator and pumps that help him irrigate the farm. 

The 35-years-old Atsiaya usually designs his planting time to coincide with dry seasons, a time when green are scarce and in high demand. 

“When I plant the vegetables just few months before the dry season, I am assured of a better return since this is the time when the vegetables are hard to find.” 

On a good day when the business has picked-up, he makes not less than 10,000 shillings a day. 

Operating in a constituency where poverty is rife and young men have rushed to cities in search of jobs or given up and instead spend much of the time idling around, the success of the vegetable farming is a challenge to many of them. 

“What he has done proves to us that our sons and daughters can eke a living from exploiting the small pieces of land we have if they are innovative enough,” says Sophia Amayoti, a resident of the area 

His success is now making other locals to think about starting up a similar thing. 

Says Joseph Lubao:

Using profits made from selling the vegetables, Atsiaya has managed to construct a three permanent bedroom house for his parents. 

“My parents and brother help me in keeping the business going. And that is why I decided to build for them a house using the profits I make.” 

Besides the house, he also uses the collections to pay school and college fees for his siblings. 

An upbeat Atsiaya, who is a dentist by profession, says he now plans to expand his horticultural business to include growing of indigenous vegetables and tomatoes. 

“Farming vegetables has just proved to me that good money can be made from this part of Kenya, only if you become smart. And that is why I am expanding,” he says. 

With the additional crops, he hopes to employ another five young men and women. 

But it has not been rosy all through. Thieves have on several occasions made his sweat a source of their income. There are times when he has been forced to invest in night guards to keep vigil over the vegetables. 

The rise in petrol prices has also hit him hard, eating into his profits. To irrigate the vegetables, the generator requires at least 10 litres of petrol a day. This means he spends a minimum of Sh 750 from the Sh 600 it used to cost a year ago.