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Plant Clinics Taking Root in East Africa - 英语听力
From VOA learning english
This is the agriculture report
Crop disease continues to be a problem
For farmers everywhere
The non-profit center for agriculture
And Biosciences international says
Pests and diseases destroy up to
40 percent of the food grown worldwide
The center based in Britain is trying to change that
With a crop protection program
The program is called Plantwise
In the past three years
Plantwise has trained almost one thousand so-called
Plant doctors in 24 countries
One of those countries is Uganda
Recently
Plant doctor Daniel Lyazi
Set up a table under a small tent
Join market day in Mukono
The village
Is about 15 kilometers from Kampala
The capital
People brought samples of diseased plants to his clinic
One farmer brought cabbage covered in slime
Nothing can be done to save his cabbages this year
But Daniel Lyazi's advice may save the next season's crop
So he's telling me there's a small caterpillar
Rich is starting from the youngest leaf
So now easy
He's told me that the whole garden
Has been has been attacked
And affected by this caterpillar
So according to me
I know that it's a diamondback moth
The farmer has been using an insecticide
But Mr Lyazi says the chemical is the wrong one
It's tolerant-it doesn't kill the diamondback moth caterpillar
So I'm recommending him to use another insecticide called Fenkill
I'm in telling him another planting
Season he plant with onions
Onions can repel
And he can get income
He advises the farmer to plant onions
Between the rows of cabbages
As an additional measure of protection
The clinic lasts about three hours
In that time Daniel Lyazi advises about 20 farmers
The clinic takes place twice-a-month
It started last year
The Plantwise program says
There are now about 90 of these clinics in Uganda
This year donors spent close to three hundred thousand dollars
Training plant doctors and expanding the system in the country
Joseph Mulema coordinates the Plantwise program in Uganda and Zambia
He argues that plant clinics are a far more effective way
To get advice to farmers than the traditional model
In the traditional model
Agricultural extension workers visit farms
Plant clinics can oh far
Extension can off advice
Can help so many farmers in a very short time
In fact
More farmers are seen in a plant clinic session
If good mobilization is done
Than actually an extension officer can look at in an entire month
Robert Karyeija is a crop protection officer for the government
He says training plant doctors has been very important
This is because even though
There were thousands of agricultural extension workers
They just didn't know enough
They were there
But to the problem
They would be general agriculturalists
Who knew agronomy but didn't know much about
The pests and diseases
Since 2010
The center for agriculture and Biosciences international
Has set up Plantwise clinics in 12 African countries
Nine of them in East Africa and three in West Africa
And that's the agriculture report from VOA learning english
