After successfully getting rid of about 2 000 encroachers that desecrated the Michiru Mountain in Blantyre with impunity, communities have returned to the protected area to develop food forests.
The initiative, being supported by Wildlife and Environmental Society of Malawi (Wesm), Churches Action in Relief and Development (Card) and the Centre for Environmental Policy and Advocacy, has engaged the communities in restoring the greenery with fruit trees.
The mountain, which sits on about 3 000 hectares is divided into Michiru Forest Reserve, covering 2 700 hectares, and the Michiru Nature Sanctuary, taking up 304 hectares.
Both segments have been reeling under the heavy pressure as a source of fuelwood to Blantyre’s ever-growing population.
The new approach gives Chintumbira Village Forest Management Committee chairperson Lisnet Mwase hope that the communities will benefit in restoring the lost forest cover and give them economic and nutritional benefit.
“We are grateful for giving us fruit trees from which we will generate some income. Further, we would also appreciate if we were supported in beekeeping so that we should have multiple sources of income,” she says.
Mwase, who is also a member of the 320-strong Michiru Mountain Scouts, a community initiative that chased encroachers from the mountain with support from the Malawi Police Service and rangers from the Department of National Parks and Wildlife, observes that the food forest will ensure that the success of their daring effort should be preserved.
The 20-member group, comprising 15 women and five men, has started its food forest on the mountain slopes facing the Chileka International Airport.
She says the destruction of the Michiru Forest by charcoal producers and firewood sellers negatively affected livelihoods of people living at the foot of the mountain.
“We have been affected by extreme weather events. Loss of forest cover has exposed us to whirlwinds and floods that have destroyed our houses and crops. We hope the upcoming forest will offer protection to the communities,” says Mwase.
Card agro-ecology adviser Markus Lemke says a food forest is the way to go as the project has put Michiru Mountain on its way to recovery.
“Growing a food forest is very beneficial for many communities in Malawi, more especially now because of food insecurity. The communities rely on mono crops such as maize, cassava and sweet potatoes, so our goal is making them conscious about the alternative food crops,” Lemke says.
He says there is need to view agriculture and forestry as two aspects that are beneficial to each other.
“Annual crops such as maize and cassava benefit the trees that are planted nearby and also prepare the soil conditions for those trees and the survival rate for the trees is much higher,” he says.
To accelerate the growth of the trees the communities have also been trained in making bio fertiliser and Mbeya manure to ensure that the food trees grow and start bearing fruit faster.
“We also encourage them to graft the fruit trees and harvest rain water along the contours so that the water is used more efficiently especially on the slopes,” he says.
The initiative has also introduced vertiver grass on the mountain as another way of controlling runoff.
Says Lemke: “There are many benefits between the plants as we use natural succession as our driver so we observe nature and try to imitate natural patterns as we grow a forest.
“We accelerate those succession processes. That means a forest that grows between 200 and 300 years, we probably shorten it to about 20 to 25 years to grow a productive food forest.”
He is hopeful that the security arrangements that have been put in place will be sufficient to ward off encroachers.
Lemke says the food forest concept seeks to integrate as many native species as possible without affecting the ecological balance.
“The native species are well adapted in a food forest. For example, Katope (water berry) is a native tree, but papaya is not, so we have to find a balance between the new modern crops that are commercially viable and the ones that are forgotten from our forefathers because they are so crucial to soil health and fertility,” he says.
Can anything good come from a protected area? Michiru Mountain is set to show us that the protected area can be transformed into a food forest.
