Meet Zamfara’s herdsmen-turned-yam farmers

Cattle rearing is the prime   occupation that all the 20 families in the village are engaged in; every house there has its flock of animals and like many other nomads, every adult male can tell stories about their experiences, while rearing cattle. However, the spectacular difference between this community and other Fulani settlements throughout Zamfara […]

Cattle rearing is the prime   occupation that all the 20 families in the village are engaged in; every house there has its flock of animals and like many other nomads, every adult male can tell stories about their experiences, while rearing cattle.

However, the spectacular difference between this community and other Fulani settlements throughout Zamfara State is that the cheap source of income for its inhabitants is not in their livestock, it is in yam farming.

Except in some very few states, yams are not commonly grown in northern Nigeria, much less in areas that are categorized as arid regions like Zamfara – which nonetheless, produces varieties of other crops. However, by sheer gesture of nature, some areas around Tsafe Local Government of the state have been very suitable for the cultivation of the commodity, albeit in some commercial quantity.

Investigations showed that other villages that are into yam farming include Makera, Tallan Kwado, Gangara, Fegen Dan Marke, Rugar Na’Ali or Darada. With the exception of the Fulani settlement, all the other communities are peopled by the Hausas.

Sixty-two-year-old Alhaji Lawwali Na-Darada is the head of Darada village. Apart from being a leader in his community, he is a proud owner of two herds of cattle and yam  fields. Alhaji Na-Darada recalled how yam farming started in the days of his parents, about 30 years ago. “Their animals produced the manure they used on their yam farms,” he said.

However, his parents were merely subsistent farmers who looked more for food than fortune from the yams.While he inherited only cattle herding and yam farming from them, he moved a step further to make it a source of income.

He had just planted his farms when we interviewed him.   If his calculations are not distorted by vagaries of weather or affliction of pests, the farms will be due for harvest in August or September, when he will smile to the market and then to the bank.

“Yam has provided us with a viable alternative to selling our cows,” he said, adding that, “when we  needed money during emergency situations in the past, we sold our cows to take care of the pressing demands. Now we don’t sell cows. We rather sell yams to get the needed money.”

Their involvement in yam farming has reduced the outbreak of clashes between them and neighbouring farming communities, by empowering them to buy, instead of commandeering what the cattle will eat, Weekly Trust learnt. “We don’t herd our animals into people’s farm as expatriate Fulanis frequently come here to do, sparking trouble as a result. We buy the stalks and the leftovers from farmers after harvesting and feed our cattle with it. That is why we are never fighting farmers,” said 60-year-old Alhaji Abdulkadir Lawwali, who said he has sold over N100,000 worth of yams this year.

They said the coming of yam three decades ago added new diet to their local menu. “My favourites are fura, tuwo and pounded yam. In fact, I had pounded yam for lunch this afternoon. So, if you had come earlier, you would have tasted it,” said Alhaji Lawwali. “All our wives are good at preparing pounded yam.”

The village head will not disclose how much he earns from his farm, just as he was not disposed to revealing the number of his cows, but he would admit that they are reaping a fortune from their yam farms.

Across the footpath traversing the array of yam farms in the village, is his nephew’s farm. According to Alhaji Na-Darada, the farm is expected to yield an estimated N1million worth of tubers at harvest period, later in the year.

“Nothing brings money  here like yam farming because it allows us to mix it with other crops like beans, soya beans and rice, thus raising income significantly,” explained the village head.

Before they settled for the yam farms and allow their children to take over, Alhaji Na-Darada and his younger brother, Alhaji Lawwali, had been rearing cattle as far as Birnin Gwari in Kaduna state, but they have never encountered Fulanimen growing yams.

“I have come across them cultivating millet, sorghum and corn, but I have never experienced any Fulaniman engaged in yam farming as we do here,” stated Alhaji Lawwali.

And for supposedly taking a bizarre path, they have been severally rebuked by their kith and kin, according to the village head. “Whenever other Fulanimen come here, they ask us if we tilled the farm ourselves or hired Kado (a word for Hausas) to do it for us. They would express shock when we tell them we did it with our hands. The extreme criticism came from the ones (Fulanis) from Niger Republic, who would tell us ‘any person who did this labour cannot have any strength left to sleep with his wife’,” he narrated.

The tribal leader said they are not bordered by such pillories, because by taking to farming, they have shown compliance with the injunction of the great Fulani islamic scholar and reformist, Sheikh Uthman bn Fodiyo. “Njengen, remen, ndure, (study, farm, rear cattle) Shehu instructed us,” he posited forcefully.

The Fulanis admitted that yam cultivation is a labour intensive and not meant for lazy hands, explaining that a yam farmer is expected to make giant ridges in which the tubers will grow and also weed the farm for about four or five  times before harvest.

They said if these requirements are not met, there are slim chances that yield will be good. Similarly, they said where the farm is too large for an individual to till, one has to go for paid labour, which can gulp a huge sum. The same thing applies when for fertilizers have to be purchased in case animal dung is inadequate.

A consolation that is available to them however, is to mix-crop the yam with beans and other staples like rice, especially as the valleys between the giant ridges are deep enough to support rice. “When we mix it that way, we recover the money spent on weeding and other farm work,” explained Alhaji Lawwali.

Hausas too

Fegen Baza  is one of the Hausa communities in Zamfara State that has embraced yam farming. Like it is with the settled Fulanis of Darada, this community was said to have started cultivating yams about 30 years ago and since then, everyone takes pride in its yam farm.

What differentiates the two communities, however, is that in Fegen Baza, yams are not only grown, but they are also sold. And that is why stalls dot the town where they overlook the crossing highway.

Being that Darada’s head is under the rulership of the district head of Fegen Baza, a close relationship exists between the two communities, nonetheless. The representative of the district head, Alhaji Sani Hussaini, told Weekly Trust that when, a week earlier, his principal went on an enlightenment campaign to the Fulani village, he was presented tubers of yams by the village head.

Alhaji Husaini said in the past, not up to 10 people were into yam farming, adding that it was over the years that more and more members of the community discovered the economic benefit of the crop.

The people of Fegen Baza argued that their yam is the best all over the country. They said it has a special taste that appeals to many consumers. “People seeking contracts and politicians looking for favours from certain quarters, offer our yams as bribe to officials, knowing that whoever eats it must appreciate it,” says Alhaji Badamasi Tijjani, who farms and sells yam.

“I have been to Gombe and seen big yams brought from Taraba and it got me salivating. But when I ate it, it was not as sweet as the ones we grow here,” he stated.

In this town, it was gathered that some people prefer to plant yams to other food crops , because they are sure of getting enough money to buy the others   at the end of the day. “No crop fetches money like yam,” Alhaji Hamisu holds.

Like the Fulani farmers, the major problem encountered by this community is the market. According to the residents, few people outside the state actually know that yams are grown there. But another problem they say is availability of pesticides and fertilizer.

They argued that if the hitches are done away with, their varieties like Farar doya, Yankwandai, Ma’anfa and Baka (Akawala), can sell anywhere in the world.