Eric Maundu never wanted to be a farmer. Raised in an agricultural community in Kenya, he learned early on to equate that way of life with unrewarding, sunbaked drudgery. Given the opportunity to go to college, he opted for a career that would take him as far away from plows, chickens and fertilizer as possible - electronics and computer science. Now, 14 years after moving to the Bay Area, the soft-spoken programmer is once again reaping and sowing crops - though this time with technological help. Maundu, 46, is the founder of Kijani Grows, an aquaponics company based in downtown Oakland. Using "nothing more than sticks, stones and a computer," Maundu fashions freestanding aquaponics systems, soilless gardens that are watered and fertilized by an integrated fish tank. The gardens are fully automated and (if Maundu's diet is anything to go by) very productive. "I come from a place that's very dry," Maundu explains. "Seeing any plant grow without soil completely changed my thinking." Quitting his job as a software engineer in San Francisco, he returned to Kenya, where he spent the next six months (and most of his money) designing a system that could grow vegetables using no soil and little water. Observing the environmental destruction that had happened in eastern Kenya during his absence because of overcultivation and deforestation, he wanted his system to be fully computer-guided. "Farmers take shortcuts because their work is hard and they need to do everything quickly," he says. "But what if something could grow the plants for me at nature's speed, and then I could just come get my food when I'm ready?"