Grena Transitions to Agroecology and Averts Hunger at Home
In 2018, Grena’s world was shaken when her husband was jailed for poaching in the protected Vwaza Game Reserve in Rumphi District, in the northern part of Malawi. Living at the foot of the mountain bordering the reserve, her family often struggled with hunger and conflict with wildlife. His release coincided with the arrival of an agricultural livelihoods project in her village at Kankhoka. Determined to change her family’s fortunes, Grena Banda joined.
“I knew I had to fight hunger in my home,” she recalls. “The goats, pigs, chickens, and the savings group gave me hope that life could be different.”
By 2024, Grena was introduced to agroecology, which she calls a “game changer.” A year later, the implementing partner SPRODETA, sent her for training in agroecology at the Permaculture Paradise Institute.
Today, her homestead stands as a model for improved farming practices. She redesigned her land into five agroecological zones, including what she said is a vibrant “Zone Zero” between her kitchen and main house, planted with vegetables nourished by kitchen wastewater. She claims that no water drop should be wasted but re-used to give new life.
Standing at her doorway, she prides and smiles: “I harvest vegetables just steps from my kitchen. Even the water from cooking is feeding my garden. Nothing goes to waste.”
Her iron‑roofed house now harvests rainwater, channeling it into vegetable beds with an orange tree at the center decorated with some newly blossoming cover plants. Around her home, granadilla vines climb non fruit trees, forming what she envisions as a “fruity veranda.”
Grena claims that food security is no longer a dream. “For two years now, I’ve stored enough grain to last the lean season. I don’t worry anymore,” she says proudly. She attributes this to practices like the use of Mbeya fertilizer (an organomineral fertilizer produced by mixing locally available ingredients like maize bran, ash, animal dung and water) and growing resilient local maize varieties. She however says she looks further to transitioning into organic manure only.
Her fields showcase mixed farming, nitrogen‑fixing trees, fruit trees, and soil conservation techniques like box ridges, swales and vetiver grass. In her “Zone 5,” she allows natural forest regeneration, preparing beehives and hoping wildlife will return.
Her success has rippled across the community. Yamanya Kumwenda, the group’s chairperson, explains: “We used to walk five kilometers to buy tomatoes. Now, we grow enough to sell, and people come to us. We have become producers.”
Kumwenda further boosts that the project has also influenced chiefs to revise their land ownership laws that barred women in a patrilineal decency to own land. Women are equally provided with land ownership rights.
According to the latest official IPC (Integrated Food Security Phase Classification) analysis, about 4 million people in Malawi are currently food insecure between October 2025 and March 2026.
Grena says agroecological practices are a gamechanger as they have potential to transform an entire community while using locally available seeds.
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