Organic vegetables find place on urban tables

Elderly Mary Wambui has been a struggling vegetable farmer in Juja until a year ago when she learnt how to triple income from her one acre plot.

Her specialty crops for the last eleven years have been spinach and sukumawiki (kales) because they are fast moving and have a ready market, especially in Nairobi.

For every kilo of spinach she brought to the market in the city, Wambui pocketed Sh5 from middlemen who would then transport the vegetable to their clients; mainly restaurants, hotels and supermarkets.

Today, for every kilo of spinach she harvests, she is assured of Sh15, triple the initial amount. It is not that the price for the produce has tripled, rather Wambui is among thousands of farmers who are taking to growing organic crops.

Organic food may not strike you as a subject that requires attention until it becomes clear that most, if not all, of the vegetables consumed in Nairobi constitute outrageous amounts of disease causing chemical residue.

A survey randomly done within Nairobi by the Kenya Organic Agriculture Network (Koan) and Quest Laboratories — testing for pesticide residues in common vegetables from several Nairobi markets — found that residents are consuming foods with high levels of chemical residues that have negative impact on their health and environment.

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