| dc.description.abstract | Nyansiongo settlement scheme was started in 19G3, soon after Kenya’s attainment of independence. Its objectives were to resettle selected members of the Abagusii in the former White- highland are«i. It was intended to ease the prevailing land pressure in Kisii and Nyamira districts; the project also aimed at providing the settlers with development loans to enable them to initiate a high productivity farming target set by European farmers who previously managed these areas. It was also hoped that the project would enable the country attain self sufficiency in food production and to produce i cash export crop (tea) to earn the country some foreign exchange. The farmers were supposed to transform from just being t raditional subsistence producers to modern market oriented producers.
This study was conducted between November 1989 to February 1990, and its purpose was to establish the direction and magnitude of change that had occurred among the resettled farmers socially and economically. To achieve that goal it became necessary to document and analyze the socio-economic and cultural clwinges among
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the resettlers in the scheme. An evaluation of kinship organization and neighbourhood interactional patterns has been done and the results indicate that organized corporate groups such as lineages and clans are no longer operative in the settlement scheme.
The methods of data collection used in this study comprised closed and open ended quest ionnaires, participant observation, both
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formal and informal interviews and case studies. All those methods were considered necessary in order to cross-check and reinforce information and also to ensure validity and reliability of data collected.
The farmers have by and large transformed their farming methods from traditional subsistence oriented to market oriented ones. Socially the farmers have to a large extent adapted to the new environment by leading lifestyles that tend to be urbnnlike characterized by such features as investing in the environment, living in permanent houses, being more individualistic and self- reliant rather than relying on social net-works in performing their farming activities and have taken farming as a specialized and a commercial activity.
The study adopted the dialogical modernization model which presupposes that for any meaningful changes to be effected government change agents such as veterinary and agricultural extension workers should have dialogue with the farmers. The findings show that the overall Abagusii farmers in Nyansiongo settlement have undergone significant socio-economic and cultural changes. They definitely enjoy a higher standard of living than they did in the pre-settlement area. They Have bigger pieces of land which they have utilized in the, production of more food and cash crops. They live in better houses and earn sufficient income from both farming and non-farming activities. | |
