Francis Kizito from Nakifuma needed only Shs450,000 to start his half acre garden of onions in 2012. This included buying the seedlings/bulbs from the farmers in the neighbouhood as well as the labour to clear the field. He was already blessed with a large expanse of family land and that no doubt helped to make his start easier.
It has been five years since he started on a journey to grow red onions specifically and today he is in so deep he doesn’t see himself doing anything else. The 27-year-old told Matooke Republic how he grew up in a humble family where his parents always woke up early every day to go and tend their maize and beans garden and this is where his passion for farming was birthed.
“I grew up seeing my parents putting all their efforts in farming however their concentration was so much on growing cereals like maize. I decided this time round to twist the game a little bit. I was given advice to try out onions [and because] it also required little in terms of labour I was convinced,” Kizito said.
Fancy growing onions?
According to Kizito, anyone who wants to venture into onion growing should first and foremost establish the suitability of the soil in the area where they intend to grow the spice. The young farmer told us onions do best in well drained, sandy loam soils with a pH range between 6.5 to 7.0. They can be planted from either seeds, sets or transplants.
“For commercial farming I would recommend that you use either transplants or sets to plant onions.
“It’s preferable to plant your onions at the onset of the rains, although you can also plant in any other season if you have means of irrigating your field. Make rows 12 to 18 inches apart, and then place onion sets or transplants in 1cm deep holes in the soils and then gently cover the new transplants with soil,” he advised, emphasising the importance of watering thoroughly after planting in case it does not rain very often. Onions need about four months to mature.
Kizito revealed that he grows majorly two types of red onions; namely Bombay and Pinoy and he explained that alhough these two types have a lower yield, they are in high demand at the Usafi and Nakasero markets- where he too mainly supplies his buyers. Although he declined to state what his exact returns are, he warned intending onion farmers about pests such as onion fly, onion thrips, and onion neck rot dis-order. But for a farmer whose onion growing business has multiplied four times from half an acre to two acres in five years, there is no turning back.