Hello! I’m Andiswa Nyongwana from South Africa, an MSc CCFAS student, at National University of Ireland, Galway and I’m sponsored by Irish Aid.
During my internship at the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, I worked with numerous farmers ranging from smallholder farmers to commercial farmers. Most of them were being negatively impacted by climate change, they needed financial support and production methods to increase their resilience against climate change. From my interaction with farmers, I got inspired to pursue a higher degree in climate change and acquire essential skills, related to climate change adaptation and mitigation, that I can share directly or indirectly with farmers back in South Africa.
I completed my high schooling in ML Sultan Secondary in 2011, afterwards I enrolled for a BSc in Agriculture (Agribusiness) at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), where I was sponsored by the KZN Provincial Government and UKZN, in 2015 I graduated. After my studies I worked as an agricultural economist intern at the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, KwaZulu-Natal.
In this blog I will be sharing my MSc CCAFS research project journey, that will be supervised by NUI Galway MScCCAFS program and the Development Bank of Southern Africa.