Robert Muriithi’s farming career began in 2012, when he purchased a piece of land.
With a clear vision and drive, he took on the difficult challenge of turning this unproductive piece of land into a successful company.
Little did he realise that this land would lay the groundwork for his future prosperity.
Muriithi’s success is attributed in large part to his use of irrigation farming.
Water is the lifeblood of any agricultural endeavour, and Muriithi realised this early on.
Fortunately, he is a beneficiary of the Green Paradise Community Water project, which supplies irrigation water to 750 people in the area.
This project, along with donated pipes from the Upper Tana Natural Resources Management Project, channels water from the all-seasons River Thuci downstream to farms like Muriithi’s, spanning an amazing 11 kilometres.
Muriithi’s pawpaw plantation is impressive, with 1,000 pawpaw fruits in the vega F1 and red royale kinds.
His accomplishment with pawpaws alone earns him around Ksh 50,000 each week.
This revenue has enabled him to reach key milestones in his life, such as purchasing extra land, educating his children and building a decent house, among others.
Muriithi’s farming career began nearly three decades ago, when he was fresh out of high school.
Back then, he began with a Ksh 1,000 loan from a relative and a little plot of land gifted to him by his parents.
“I would draw water from a 100ft well and haul with my hands on two jerricans up to the farm. It was an energy sapping toil, but you have to start somewhere,” he said.
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As he continued to work and save, Muriithi joined a local savings group, known as a chama, and managed to save Sh20,000.
He used this money to buy a water pump, which was a useful piece of equipment for his farming.
Muriithi experimented with a variety of crops, including maize, watermelons, capsicum, tomatoes, butternuts and long chilli.
“Eventually, I settled for pawpaw, mangoes, and oranges. They do not require a lot of farm inputs. This means the cost of production is lower. Moreover, they do not suffer from price fluctuations,” he stated.
He notes that the cost of producing an acre of pawpaws, which may support 600 trees, is roughly Ksh 100,000.
It takes around seven months for the pawpaw trees to begin producing, and each tree can produce up to 30 kilogrammes of pawpaw.
While these trees can bear fruit for up to four years, the region’s high sunshine reduces their lifespan to roughly two years in Muriithi’s case.
Despite his extraordinary successes, Muriithi confronts significant hurdles on his farming path.
One of the most persistent difficulties is the presence of mealy bugs and spider mites, which have afflicted farms in the Mt. Kenya region, including Muriithi’s orchard.
These pests endanger his pawpaw crop, with spider mites causing yellowing that persists long after spraying, and mealy bugs destroying the fruit by sucking its juice.
Muriithi too faces water scarcity, despite its proximity to a river.
Water scarcity can have a substantial influence on farm production, emphasising the significance of effective irrigation systems such as those provided by the Green Paradise Community Water project.
