Latest news with #Ouma
The Star
4 days ago
- Science
- The Star
Feature: Kenyan smallholders embrace smart technology to boost yields
NAIROBI, May 29 (Xinhua) -- In western Kenya, maize farmer Josephat Ouma walked through rows of green, leafy stalks with a smartphone in hand. He paused and bent down before snapping a picture of a sickly-looking leaf. "I used to wait for someone to come and help. Sometimes, they never came. Now, I take a photo, and the app tells me what is wrong," he told Xinhua in a recent interview. Like Ouma, thousands of smallholder farmers in Kenya are turning to technology to manage crop diseases and fight declining yields. In a region where traditional extension services are stretched thin as some counties have only one officer for every 1,500 farmers, affordable tools such as artificial intelligence (AI), mobile apps and WhatsApp groups are emerging as indispensable lifelines. One such tool is called PlantVillage Nuru, a free app developed by researchers at Penn State University, which uses AI to analyze photos of crops and instantly diagnose diseases such as maize lethal necrosis or cassava mosaic. It functions offline and supports local languages, making it especially useful in rural areas. "The app is so easy to use, even for farmers who are not literate," said an agricultural extension officer in Kakamega County of western Kenya, who works closely with smallholders using the app. Across Kenya, localized WhatsApp groups now function as mini extension networks. Farmers share pest alerts, crop management advice, and photos of affected crops, allowing others to crowdsource diagnoses and solutions. "It is like a daily clinic," said James Otieno, a maize farmer near the western Kenyan county of Kisumu. "You wake up, check your group, and see what others are facing." In Bungoma County, Catherine Wanjala faced repeated losses to striga, commonly known as witchweed, a parasitic plant that attacks the roots of maize and sorghum. Traditional methods, including herbicides and crop rotation, had failed. Then she was introduced to a fungal bioherbicide that significantly boosted her yields. "Before using the bioherbicide, my maize was weak and yellow. It barely grew," Wanjala told Xinhua. "After the treatment, the difference was like night and day." Agricultural organizations are also leading the way in digital adoption. One Acre Fund's Kenya-based initiative Tupande has integrated AI and machine learning into its services to improve field-level recommendations. "We use advanced systems to tailor advice based on farm-level data like soil moisture and productivity," said Makandi Laiboni, director of digital strategy at Tupande. "Even a simple change, like optimizing planting dates, can significantly reduce losses and boost yields." The Tupande mobile app, which has about 150,000 users to date, is especially popular among youth aged 18 to 35. "Reaching young farmers is crucial for the future of agriculture," added Karigu Ekumbo, Senior Communications Specialist at One Acre Fund. "They are more receptive to digital tools and help expand our impact in both rural and urban areas." According to Ekumbo, barriers remain. Women, for instance, account for only 30 percent of Tupande's app users. "While that is above the national average, we are focused on closing the gender gap in agritech by tailoring support for female farmers," Ekumbo said. A recent study by the Kenya Institute for Public Policy Research and Analysis estimated that only 20 to 30 percent of Kenyan farmers have adopted digital agricultural technologies. This limited uptake underscores a significant gap in scaling up these services, which hold immense potential to boost productivity, profitability, and market access for smallholder farmers. "We used to wait and hope. Now we know and act," Ouma said, surveying his healthy field. "It is not magic. It is just good information."
IOL News
15-05-2025
- Entertainment
- IOL News
The Great Tsek: What a Meme Can Tell Us About White South Africa's Real Escape Plan
TikTok memes of Afrikaner panic distract from the real betrayal — the liberal white brain drain that quietly fled with privilege intact. Gillian Schutte exposes the projection economy of whiteness. Image: Supplied By Gillian Schutte South African humour has once again taken root on TikTok: white migration parody. These aren't real departure videos. They're satires, staged and edited by mostly middle-class white South Africans depicting Afrikaner "refugees" exiting the country hoping for a whiter, brighter future in America. In these clips, families from places like Brakpan or Boksburg pack up bakkies with Koo tins, whisper solemn goodbyes to their gardens, and strap confused boerbols into the front seat. A child in a Springbok jersey cries as the family heads for Texas. The captions read 'Goodbye Ouma, Hello Walmart' or 'Last Braai Before the Border.' They mock the idea of white panic — but with a particular target: those visibly unsettled, unskilled, and poorly equipped for the post-apartheid world. What the memes really parody — perhaps unintentionally — is a long-standing pattern of flight dressed up as foresight. The title these meme-makers don't always explain is The Great Tsek. Tsek, in township slang, is a riff on voetsek — the Afrikaans 'get lost,' reinterpreted as f**k off. And this is precisely what has unfolded over the last 30 years: a long, layered, racially coded f**k-off from the promises of democracy. TikTok memes of Afrikaner panic distract from the real betrayal — the liberal white brain drain that quietly fled with privilege intact. Gillian Schutte exposes the projection economy of whiteness. Image: Supplied The meme-makers themselves — often liberal whites living in Cape Town, Joburg's loftier enclaves, or abroad — aren't innocent observers. Besides appropriating a black term like they were its originators, they are, in many cases, the relatives of the original exodus: the liberal brain drain that quietly fled in the early 2000s. Those earlier departures weren't filmed. They were notarised. The First Great Tsek involved no bakkies, no tears, no Steve Hofmeyr soundtracks. Just bank transfers, EU passports, elite university placements, and farewell brunches in suburbs soon renamed for foreign consulates. These were the whites who had enthusiastically embraced the Mandela moment, benefited from post-apartheid appointments, property prices, and the glow of being progressive — and then left before transformation could rearrange the hierarchy too fully. Now, sipping flat whites in Vancouver, Berlin, or Perth, they share the latest TikTok parody, laughing at the working class Brakpan family panicking at the threshold of irrelevance. 'We're not like them,' they say — from safe distances, in sanitised democracies. But they are. Their performance is more discreet. Their fear was just better funded. This is textbook projection. Mock the thing you once were. Create distance from the part of yourself still invested in your fleeing. And flee they all did — from Die Swart Gevaar. No longer shouted through loudspeakers, the old apartheid fear now mutters itself into euphemisms: 'service delivery,' 'crime,' 'we had no future there.' The fear wasn't of violence — it was of governance. Of becoming irrelevant. Of no longer being the protagonist in the national story. AfriForum, of course, recognised the panic for what it was — useful. Faced with the growing embarrassment of 40,000 impoverished Afrikaners — living in informal settlements, outside of the racial myth of white economic success — they rebranded them as refugees. It was a clever narrative sleight of hand. The poor white problem became the persecuted white minority. Enter Trump. Primed by AfriForum's curated crisis, he expected to rescue stoic farmers — rugged, land-owning, God-fearing Calvinists. What he got was a loose assortment of unskilled, economically displaced white South Africans hoping that whiteness still had trade value. It did not. They became punchlines again — this time in the American meme economy. 'You're not coming here to own land,' one creator quipped. 'You're here to mow it.' Others were more blunt: 'You're replacing the Mexicans,' and from Black American creators, 'We won't be washing your underwear.' Meanwhile, the original liberal leavers remain untouched. They laugh from repurposed precincts in Melbourne or glassy co-working spaces in London. They repost the memes, relieved that someone else is now carrying the visible burden of white decline. This is the theatre of displacement. The poor white panic becomes a caricature. The liberal white exodus becomes invisible. What unites them isn't class or tone, but the impulse to tsjek. The memes are funny. The imagined garden gnome goodbyes. The dramatics about Idaho and replacing Boxers with Walmart. But the real theatre happened earlier — in embassies, in bank offices, in the offshoring of conscience. And Die Swart Gevaar, ever-morphing, ever-haunting, continues to animate both the satire and the silence. South Africa is left with the consequences — a thinning middle class, an unfinished national project, and a meme economy that disguises historic betrayal. And, in the end, whether they left with satire or suitcases, with Koo tins or capital gains, they all did the same thing: They all f**ked off in the end. * Gillian Schutte is a South African writer, filmmaker, and critical-race scholar known for her radical critiques of neoliberalism, whiteness, and donor-driven media. Her work centres African liberation, social justice, and revolutionary thought. ** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL or Independent Media.
The South African
07-05-2025
- Business
- The South African
FlySafair's 'Lekker R11 Sale' kicks off NOW
FlySafair's 'Lekker R11 Sale' is now on! The popular sale will kick off today, 7 May 2025, at 9:00 sharp! Flight tickets will go for just R11 and these super-low fares are, as always, expected to sell out in minutes once the sale goes live on the airline's website. According to reports, the R11 tickets will cover FlySafair's Lite Fare class, which includes one checked-in bag as well as airport taxes. 'Aweh, Mzansi! Your favourite sale is back and hotter than a bunny chow with extra atchar. For today only, we've got 50 000 flight tickets going for just R11 to all major cities in SA. That's cheaper than a pack of Nik Naks, sweeter than Ouma's rusks, and crispier than a freshly braaied tjoppie! Set your alarms, because our Lekker R11 Sale kicks off at 9 am sharp and runs until every last ticket is snatched up.' FlySafair announced on social media. According to the airline, in order to take part in the R11 sale, you will need to visit FlySafair's official website when the sale kicks off. All eligible tickets will then be available on a first-come, first-served basis. Other information about the sale can be found below: Tickets are limited and only apply to specific routes and flight dates. The promotion only applies to domestic flights. Bookings must only be made via FlySafair's official website. The offer cannot be used in conjunction with any other promotion or voucher. Let us know by leaving a comment below, or send a WhatsApp to 060 011 021 1 . Subscribe to The South African website's newsletters and follow us on WhatsApp , Facebook, X, and Bluesky for the latest news.
