Farming in Central Africa

New Zealand Listener, Volume 31, Issue 802, 3 December 1954, Page 21

Farming in Central Africa

F a New Zealand farmer were to visit Africa he would find that while the standard of farming there.can be distressingly poor it can also reach a high level. That was what Hilary Phillips found when he went there about a year ago for the BBC. One of his discoveries, which should interest farmers in this country, was that the dairy zebu cattle in the herd of the School of Agriculture of the University — of Khartoum are giving an annual yield of butterfat which compares favourably with the yield in New Zealand.

Mr. Phillips, who went to Africa to look at farming and to find out what sort of radio talks interested farmers there, took a tape recorder with him to gather material for his programme Land and Livestock. Well, farmers and others talked for his recorder, and when he got back home Mr. Phillips decided he might have a story of more general interest to tell-"a story that is only just coherent . . . because you cannot really cover many thousands of miles through seven different countries in 38 days without becoming a little confused, especially if those countries —

are in Africa."’ . The route of this journey was through ‘Kenya, Tanganyika, Nyasaland, Southern Rhodesia, Northern Rhodesia, Uganda and the Sudan, and the story is told in A Farmer’s Safari, to be broadcast from 2¥C* at 9.32 pm. on Tuesday, December 12, and _ later from other stations. Introducing his programme in London Calling when it was first broadcast, Mr Phillips said: "If I were asked to write down quickly things which I remember I would put down these: the Kenya Royal Show — just~ like a) British agricultural |

show; the Nairobi Club-just like a London club; the crickets singing at night; the suddenness of nightfall; the appatling roads; the universal hospitality; the intense political discussion; the huge distances; the sunless heat; the heat inside an aeroplane on a_ baking airstrip and the relief of the coolness when flying at 5000 feet; Kilimanjaro from the air; the beautiful clothes and the stately carriage of the women of Uganda; the impossible loads carried by Kikuyu women in Kenya; and the fortitude of the European women in Kenya." —