Farmer turns to local innovation to help build soil health

Deteriorating soil health is an issue that increasingly impacts farmers of all scales. As food-crop demand increases, so does the amount of chemical fertiliser required to scale up production. Continuous application of fertiliser can sap the soil of its natural minerals and nutrients, requiring more fertiliser—a vicious cycle. Using organic and sustainable soil conditioners is an important farming practice that can mitigate this. In addition, with the currently limited supply and rising costs of imported agri-inputs due to the long-tail impact of COVID-19 and the ongoing war in Ukraine, the availability of locally produced solutions is vital to the long-term sustainability of Fiji’s agriculture sector.

In 2022, MDF partnered with Baywater Engineering, a local company that developed a liquid compost, to generate greater awareness of the availability and benefits of its organic soil conditioner. Baywater’s ‘OrganicPlus’ is an innovative, local farming solution that uses discarded organic material, such as chicken manure and distillery waste, to produce an environmentally sustainable and affordable soil conditioner for horticultural and root crop farming. It was the idea of a readily available, fast-absorbing compost solution that first convinced Capt. Jone Dansey to try Baywater Engineering’s OrganicPlus liquid compost.