We get all our Milk from Soya Beans

In Summary
· To make milk, Margaret starts by boiling the soya beans for 10 minutes to soften them.
· From her five-acre farm, she harvests about eight tonnes of soya beans after every four months.
Every morning, as dairy farmers across the country wake up to milk their cows, Margaret Abich, a resident of Awendo in Migori County, normally wakes up too.
However, the farmer does not wake up to milk cows, but to make milk from soya beans. “It’s very simple to make milk from soya beans. The procedure takes less than 15 minutes. It is easier than milking a cow,” says the farmer.
Margaret is among dozens of farmers in the county, who have embraced growing of the crop and they are making milk from it, and other products that include soya beverages and soya meat. To make milk, Margaret starts by boiling the soya beans for 10 minutes to soften them.
“I then pour the boiled beans into a small portable posho mill-like machine called a mincer. I, thereafter, ground them until they turn into a fine powder.” Thereafter, she mixes the powder with a little warm water and sieves for the milk to come out.
“The powder is normally thick. So one must add some water. The product is then allowed to settle for five minutes and then sieved. The milk will be ready for consumption.”
Margaret, 40, mainly sells the milk and other products she makes from soya at Nyakuru trading centre, over 5km away from her home.
They are branded Awendo Soya Products and are sold to small-scale traders and individuals. They cost between Sh50 and Sh500.
“Majority of residents buy my milk to make tea because it’s affordable and has more nutrients than cow milk. Some villagers also ferment.”
A litre of soya milk retails at Sh60. On the other hand, residents buy cow milk at between Sh80 and Sh100.
Margaret also makes soya nuts popularly known as ‘‘njugu soya’’. Soya nuts are made by frying the beans and adding salt for taste and flavour. She also makes soya mandazi (doughnut).  “I make the mandazis and sell them daily at Sh5 each. I also sell between 20 to 30 litres of soya milk daily.”
In a month, she earns between Sh30,000 to Sh50,000 from selling the products.
Margaret and other farmers in the region got the knowledge from Kenya Industrial Research and Development Institute (Kirdi), which trained farmers on how to add value to the food crop in 2008.
From her five-acre farm, she harvests about eight tonnes of soya beans after every four months. Johnson Agwaya, 49, is another soya beans farmer in Migori.
From his five-acre farm, he harvests nine tonnes of soya beans in four months. “Soya takes only four months to mature and offers better returns than sugarcane, which we used to grow,” says Agwaya, who started growing the crop in 2011 and also processes milk from soya.
Sugarcane and tobacco have been the dominant crops in Awendo for many decades. But due to falling prices and delay in payments, farmers have switched to soya.
Daniel Midoda of Migori County Soya Beans Farmers Cooperative says soya changes the fortunes of farmers in a short time.
“Since we have identified ready market for farmers, we encourage them to grow soya on large-scale,” he tells Seeds of Gold.
Elisha Onyango, a research scientist at Kirdi, says 40 per cent of soya nutrients are proteins.
“The milk processed from soya has 9.5 per cent nutrients than cow milk, which has only 3.9 per cent,” says Onyango. He adds that soya is a legume crop that adds fertility to the soil.
Source: Everline Okewo, Nation Newspaper