Many university students shun agriculture courses. For decades, scholars have expressed concern about the declining number of students opting for agriculture studies. Universities records in Kenya indicate that if the trend continues, we will not have any graduates in agriculture in the coming years.
It is for these reasons that a group of comrades in public and private universities across the country have joined forces and formed Kenya Agriculture Students Association, an organisation that aims to convince students to embrace agriculture, and to make them aware that farming can be just as lucrative and interesting as a career in law, medicine or engineering.
They see themselves as ambassadors of change, and their mission is to influence Gen Z and millennials who are about to join university to consider agriculture-related courses.
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I am studying Animal Sciences and Technology, and Im in my fourth year hoping to graduate at the end of this year. I am excited that my comrades have established the Kenya Agriculture Students Association (KASA), a group that aims to convince university students to take agriculture courses, which are often neglected.
I think this is a noble idea that should be supported by the government. I am seeing a lot of possibilities and opportunities. Agriculture courses are not that boring, they can be as interesting and lucrative as law, engineering, and medicine.
As a director of programmes and career development at KASA, my role is to encourage first year students to consider agriculture courses because I believe that this field will soon grow in demand nationally and globally.
At KASA, we also help mould new students and connect them with job opportunities and youth programmes that can give them a head start in their careers. This is our contribution to reduce unemployment rates among the youth finishing university. We encourage them to be innovative even before they complete their studies. We also plan to visit secondary schools to encourage teenagers to study agriculture.
Personally, Im excited at the opportunities I see in this field. With the necessary knowledge, skills are resources, we can help farmers in lowland areas boost dairy production and alleviate the food shortage in this country which is now a huge crisis. We need young experts to teach farmers how to do this using the latest technology and knowledge.
I believe this knowledge in agriculture will soon be sought after by employers both locally and internationally, to plug in the widening food insecurity gaps. Therefore, students with skills will easily find jobs, and even create jobs for others. Moreover, they will be able to dictate their own terms of employment. The best time to join the bandwagon is now. Students should discard myths and negative ideas such as the notion that agriculture is for the poor.
I call on young people to embrace agriculture because technologies like digital farming are now available and have been proven to make agriculture easy and manageable. We can now obtain and analyse data in real-time. Data informs the decisions that farmers make and with the right data, there will certainly be improved yields.
Agriculture was my dream career and joining Egerton University cemented my dreams and ambitions of being a stellar farmer. My passion was ignited while I was growing up in Mbita, Homabay County, where I observed keenly as my parents practiced subsistence agriculture.
I saw them spend so much time and money but at the end of the year, the yield was not enough. That is when I vowed to study agriculture at the university to help them boost production because I saw the food they were struggling to grow for the family was dwindling every year.
Ruth Rotich, 21 Kabianga University
As a second-year student at the University of Kabianga taking a Bachelor of Science course in Agricultural Education and Extension, I feel annoyed and disgusted whenever I see young people who are reluctant to get their hands dirty.
Every time young students talk about their ambitions, all I hear them say is that they want to become doctors, pilots, or engineers. This annoys me. I have never heard anyone say they want to be a farmer. Even if you ask a farmers son, the answer would very often be the same. I believe we need to change this narrative and the best pla
