his coriander aromatic and his spinach “very soft, sweet and tasty”. His half-acre farm is a former rubbish dump in the heart of East Africa’s biggest slum.
So arresting is the sight of tall sunflowers growing amid the rust-coloured shacks and dirt paths of Kibera that Matioli and his fellow growers have had to put up a “No photographing” sign to allow them to work in peace. Their reputations - the farmers are all reformed criminals - mean the warning is seldom ignored.
The unlikely story of Kibera’s first “organic” farm — its only farm of any scale — has its roots in the chaos that gripped Kenya at the start of last year. For weeks the sprawling, densely packed slum, home to up to a million people, was gripped by ethnic clashes and street battles between riot police and protesters demonstrating over flawed presidential elections.
