Enterprise

Youths turn sweet potatoes into soap-making venture

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Mukomari Youth Bunge secretary Vincent Mutambi displays a soap made from sweet potatoes. Photo/Isaac Wale

In Kakamega County, sweet potatoes, cassava and yams are cherished as traditional food supplementing maize and beans during scarcity.

But the three traditional food crops, which are a favourite of many rural families, are now being grown for a different reason at a Kakamega village.

A group of youths from Mukomari village in Eregi have embraced the crops both as a source of food and raw material for the soap-making business they have started.

The youths have intensified a campaign in the village to ensure that residents grow sweet potatoes, cassava and yams on their farms to for families to have enough to eat and supply the group with raw material for the soap-making venture.

In Mukomari, many youths spent much of their time idling at market centres or visiting illicit brew dens to drown their frustrations due to poverty and unemployment.

Eregi location in Ikolomani constituency has a population of about 15,000 people struggling to eke a living from growing maize, beans and other traditional food crops on their tiny farms. But the poor soils hardly yield much to last farmers until the next season.

Eregi chief Andrew Mwashi said the youths in the location have been pushed into crime by poverty and unemployment but things were beginning to change for the better.

“We have managed to convince the youths to engage in horticultural production and other income generating activities to improve their livelihoods,” said Mr Mwashi.

Besides the project, the youths have also embraced horticulture, poultry and a tree planting for additional income.

Twenty-two-year old Vincent Mutambi, Mukomari Youth Bunge secretary and Andrew Musonye, 25, project manager said that they formed the group last year and identified soap making as a viable income generating activity.

The group leases idle land from the residents for planting sweet potatoes, cassava and yams to ensure a steady supply of the raw material for their venture.

The group recently showcased their prowess at a rural agricultural field day attended by residents and agricultural extension officers at the home of Joseph Lwangu.

The chief said that the project had attracted many other youths who have also formed similar groups.

“Because of the high population, youths in the location have been faced with serious challenges due to poverty and that has forced many of them to drop out of school and end up embracing crime,” said Mr Mwashi.

The turning point came when Mr Mutambi approached other youths from the village and decided to try horticulture to improve their livelihoods.

The group the group also started making bar soap using sweet potatoes, coconut oil, cooking fat and water.

The process involves mixing of given proportions of caustic soda with the materials. Sodium peroxide is added to solidify the mixture that is then placed into timber moulds and left for 24 hours for the bar soaps to form.

The group is raising money to buy enough chemicals and other raw material to increase production.

“We are targeting to produce the bar soaps from even pumpkins and sell them to villagers before supplying markets in the county,” said Mr Mutambi.

After completing secondary school education in 2010 he spent a year in the village without any hopes of finding a job.

Mr Mutambi decided to take up farming and convinced other youths to join him in cultivation of kales and bananas.

“I have been working closely with agricultural extension officers to improve my knowledge in farming and after a year, I can see light at the end of the tunnel,” he said.

Mr Musonye, a father one, said the group hopes to get financial support to expand their venture and supply their products at an affordable price.

Ikolomani agricultural extension officer Felistus Namasaka said that the group works with her department to promote horticultural production.

“Their efforts have borne fruit because they have worked closely with us and have been keen to learn new farming methods,” she said.