Regardless of location, spending time with farmers and growers, you’re reminded very quickly of one thing:
“No two farms are the same.”
The soils are different. The climate shifts from region to region. Pest and disease pressures change with altitude, humidity and crop mix. Some growers are expanding, others are in a season of consolidation. But despite the differences, one theme emerged clearly during Lee’s visit to Uganda: The most effective solutions start with listening.
In March 2026, Lee, alongside the team at Bioline AgriSciences Africa, returned to Uganda for a followup visit after Nemguard SC received full approval in the country. Rather than simply “rolling out” a product, we set out with a different intention, to understand growers’ pain points, stand alongside them in the field, and design enduser solutions that are actionable and tailored to their reality.
A growing partnership with Ugandan horticulture
Over several days, the team visited multiple farms growing roses, chrysanthemums, cuttings and other ornamentals and export crops. A shared set of challenges kept surfacing:
- Parasitic nematodes impacting root health and vigour
- Thrips, moths, fungus gnats and mealybugs damaging foliage and flowers
- Constant market pressure to reduce reliance on conventional chemistry and manage resistance, while maintaining export quality thresholds
Rather than starting with a product presentation, each farm visit began with a simple focus:
- What are you struggling with most right now?
- What have you tried, and what happened?
- What worries you most about the next season?
One of the clearest signals from the visit was how highly growers value practical, onfarm training. In advance of the trip, some teams specifically requested support on false codling moth IPM and integrating biological tools more confidently into their programmes.
Q&A: Listening, learning and cocreating with growers
A conversation between Ant Surrage and Lee Kaigai
Ant: Lee, you’ve worked closely with growers across East Africa for years. Why is listening to the starting point for every visit?
Lee: A very important aspect that enables understanding of grower needs and in turn providing practical solutions that match them and where solutions are not available immediately work with growers to develop them.
Ant: What did this trip remind you about the value of being physically present on farms?
Lee: That growers need practical solutions which are at most times localised and being present enables productive discussions with ideas that yield concrete solutions and improvements which eventually lead to strong partnerships.
One of the farms I visited realize that they have to put in place a robust system to manage FCM. The local climate provides conducive environment for this pest which they have established through monitoring with lures outside the green houses. In addition to that the farm is surrounded by other FCM hosts where the pest can nest then spread to their production areas.
Being there and interacting with the production team enabled us to have a deep dive into FCM identification, lifecycle, behaviour, conducive environments and finally discuss IPM control strategies that provide good control with specific examples including Nemguard SC which recently obtained approval fom FCM in Kenya. All this would be implemented within a systems approach.
At the end of the day we realized in situations like this you have to show up, not forgetting that I also learned a lot from their growing experiences .
Ant: We talk a lot about “cocreating solutions”. What does that actually look like in practice?
Lee: Working together to understand the crop, growing conditions and major challenges encountered by the farmer(s) then coming up with interventions that reflect todays market needs and into the future.
Ant: What stood out to you about growers’ needs on this visit?
Lee: The need for alternative low risk solutions for sustainability in all facets. Health, Safety, Environmental Protection and Economics. All now being driven by the market therefore growers have to be keen on them to remain in business
Ant: What excites you most about the momentum we’re building in Uganda?
Lee: The opportunity to be part of Uganda’s growth in production of horticultural produce that is safe, sustainable and of good quality. Sought after locally and internationally.
Ant: If you could leave growers with one message, what would it be?
Lee: The market in Uganda is now ripe for Nemguard try it and you will keep coming back for more
Partnering to make support real and reachable
None of this work happens in isolation. Our partnership with Bioline AgroSciences Africa, our distributor in East Africa which includes Uganda, is central to how ideas turn into action. The teams time in Uganda reinforced a belief that sits at the heart of Ecospray.
The best solutions are codesigned with growers, grounded in their reality, and supported over time.
If you are a grower, technical manager or distributor in East Africa and you’d like to explore NEMguard SC trials or discuss specific pest challenges on your farms, we’d be glad to talk.
After all, the most effective solutions don’t start with a product.
They start with a conversation.
