Khuong farms on two small plots of rice paddies, a total of 10 sao (nearly an acre) in Dong Dat commune of Thai Nguyen’s Phu Luong district. She attributes the good harvest to the System of Rice Intensification (SRI), a package of good agricultural practices for hand-planted rice that increase yields while using less seeds, water, and fertilizers.
Today more than 1.3 million farmers in Vietnam have embraced this innovative farming method, producing more rice and earning extra income for their families. Oxfam has been helping promote SRI in Vietnam for nearly six years, and has made possible the ongoing training of farmers in the methods.
“It’s a smart investment needed to lift people out of poverty and to boost the national economy,” says Ngo Tien Dung, Deputy Director General of the Plant Protection Department in Vietnam’s Ministry of Agriculture.
SRI practices involve five simple steps including soil preparation, plant and water management. Farmers who use SRI transplant seedlings earlier and space them individually and in square patterns farther apart to reduce competition for light, water, and nutrients.
“I save quite a lot on seeds and fertilizers,” Khuong says. “Before I used almost 50 kg (110 pounds) of seeds for the two paddy fields, but now I use only 4 or 5 kg because with SRI, I transplant only one and sometimes two seedlings per hill instead of bunches of them.”
Robust root systems, bigger and healthier plants grow more grains of rice. Khuong now produces 2.7 metric tons of rice from her two paddy fields, as compared to just 1.8 tons grown with conventional methods, a 50 percent increase.
“I’m very pleased with the results, and I’ve stop worrying now,” she says.
According to the Plant Protection Department, farmers who use SRI significantly reduce the use of chemicals, thus growing healthier food, improving soil quality, and protecting farm biodiversity. On average, SRI farmers increase their yield by 500 kilograms (1,110 pounds), and earn extra income of $130 per hectare in just one cropping season (a hectare is just under 2.5 acres). This is a significant sum in a country where average income is around $1,200.
SRI was recently honored with the National Golden Rice Award for making positive changes in the life of over a million Vietnamese farmers.
The award is an initiative of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to honor major contributions to sustainable agriculture and rural development. Fifty-six winners were selected from across Vietnam for the first biennial Golden Rice Awards, which took place in November.
SRI was the first recipient at the Golden Rice Awards ceremony, and was recognized as an innovation that helped to revitalize sustainable food production, improving food and income security for small-scale farmers in Vietnam.
“We need to build the momentum for SRI extension over the coming years,” says Ngo Tien Dung of the Plant Protection Department, who received the award for the Department’s outstanding work in promoting the farming method.
The benefits of SRI go beyond increasing yield and reducing input costs. According to a report by Africare, Oxfam, and World Wildlife Fund, SRI practices have contributed to the reduction of greenhouse gases released from agricultural activities.
By improving nutrient use efficiency, farmers reduce the use of water, fertilizers, herbicide and pesticide, resulting in reduced emissions of methane, one of the most prevalent and dangerous greenhouse gases.
Farmers also reported positive change in community relations as a result of using these techniques. SRI farmers—most of them are women—learn together and help each other in the fields. This practice has created a culture of mutual support in rural communities.
Oxfam has been supporting organizations promoting SRI in Vietnam since 2006, working closely with officials of the Plant Protection Department, and recruiting local farmers to train others. These local experts formed a core of SRI proponents and formed Farmer Field Schools that grew demonstration plots and promoted the techniques.
Because farmers who try SRI see results almost immediately, the number of SRI farmers increased five-fold from 2009 to 1.3 million in 2012.
]]>This year, over 18 million people in the Sahel region of West Africa were affected by a severe food crisis caused by drought, a failure of several crops, and sharp rises in food prices. The lives of over 1 million children were at risk from severe malnutrition. Communities across the Sahel suffered (and malnutrition rates remain dangerously high) but a major humanitarian operation, acting earlier than ever before, managed to protect the lives and livelihoods of millions of people.
Oxfam played a major part in this effort. We provided urgently needed assistance to over 1 million people throughout the year. Over 600,000 of our supporters worldwide joined us in campaigning to raise the alarm and to mobilize the international community into action.
At the end of 2012, good rainfall and better harvests have provided some relief. Cereal production is 13 percent higher than last year, but this does not mean the crisis is over. Food prices remain high and many farmers were unable to take advantage of the better rains to plant their crops. Malnutrition rates for children remain above emergency levels in many parts of the region. Millions of people still require sustained support to recover from the crisis, to rebuild their assets and livelihoods, and to be able to support their families.
As well as dealing with the immediate challenges of helping people recover, we need to work together to tackle the underlying causes of food crises in the Sahel. Even when the harvests are good, 230,000 children die of malnutrition-related causes each year. Oxfam is dedicated to supporting small-scale farmers so they can produce more food, supporting the incomes of the poorest people through cash-for-work programs, and building systems of food reserves. These are just some of ways we can help to build the resilience of communities to future shocks, and avoid crises in the future.
]]>The fields will be wet with morning dew, and, for the next few hours, said Raúl Jiménez, an organizer for FLOC (Farm Labor Organizing Committee) and a former farm worker, “you’re soaking wet, drenched in all these chemicals.”
Not just the chemicals on “the most pesticide-treated plants in the nation,” as Jiménez put it in an interview last month, but also the nicotine in the plants themselves. “You’re always exposed to it, you breathe it in, you touch it,” he said. The odds are good that at some point you’ll come down with Green Tobacco Sickness, which is caused by a high level of nicotine absorption through the skin. (Short term effects include dizziness, nausea, and dehydration – “so bad you think you’re gonna die.”)
You could wear gloves, but that would impede your ability to pluck the leaves from the bottom of the plants. You’re out there nurturing the plants by hand, rather than machine, in order to produce the highest-quality harvest, which brings a higher price for the grower. You bend over all day long, breaking off the leaves on the bottom, stashing them under your arm, leaving the top leaves to flourish.
“Your hands get black from the tar,” says Jiménez. Although regulations require wash stations (and bathrooms and drinking water) they are rare. “You have to be real careful not to touch anything.”
Tobacco plants flourish in the heat and humidity in North Carolina, which means that you are out there, too, in temperatures often above 100 degrees. Over the years several workers have died of heat stroke.
At the end of this day, you’ll go back to the “labor camp,” where toilets are lined up without partitions next to each other in a big room with sinks on the other side; where windows are few and small and have no glass; where you may have a mattress in a room with several other men – or you may sleep on the floor.
But the worst thing in all this long day is that, much of the time, you’re afraid – of deportation, of unemployment, of the crew leader, of letting down your family back in Mexico, or Guatemala – and you have no idea of your rights or your recourses.
In 2011, Oxfam America partnered with FLOC to research and publish the State of Fear report on human rights abuses in the North Carolina tobacco industry. This report has played a crucial role in recent efforts to raise the voices of farmworkers, and to get Reynolds Tobacco to engage in conversation with FLOC.
Following Oxfam’s request to supporters—in which more than 14,000 people called on Reynolds to meet with farmworkers—the company held its first face-to-face meeting with FLOC in 2012.
This was a huge step, but it’s just the beginning of the march toward real change and real justice in the fields. FLOC and partners want to keep up the pressure on Reynolds, and on some of the major chains that carry their products.
To honor International Human Rights Day, December 10, hundreds joined actions at Kangaroo stores in various cities in North Carolina to urge them to reach out to Reynolds about conditions in the fields. Kangaroo, the largest convenience store chain in the Southeast, could make a difference in the lives of thousands of tobacco farm workers.
]]>In April, former rebel fighters, who had been integrated into the Congolese army, mutinied. Dubbing themselves M23, or Mouvement 23, they took control of an area close to the borders of Rwanda and Uganda. When the Congolese army called up troops from across the region to quell the rebellion, that deployment left a security vacuum, prompting other rebel groups and militia to reassert their control.
Now, caught in the crossfire, civilians face appalling abuse at the hands of multiple armed groups. One town—Kashuga in northern Masisi—was attacked 12 times between April and July. In a new report, Commodities of War, Oxfam has documented how these waves of conflict have affected more than 760,000 people so far this year.
“Ruthless militias and government troops are both mercilessly exploiting local communities to help fund their war,” said Elodie Martel, Oxfam’s associate country director. Forced labor and recruitment, illegal taxation, and pillaging are all tactics in this conflict, along with rape, kidnap, and murder.
“These armed men enter our homes and demand money. If you don’t give it, they will kill you,” said one man from Fizi in South Kivu.
“Men no longer walk around this village since they are the ones who are taken, mostly,” added a woman from Kalehe in South Kivu.
As insecurity and uncertainty mount, the pressure on people is growing.
“More than 50,000 people have fled camps and homes since yesterday and are in dire need of shelter, water, and food,” said Tariq Riebl on Monday. Riebl is Oxfam’s humanitarian coordinator in Goma, the threatened capital of North Kivu and one of Congo’s larger cities around which cluster camps for displaced people. “Families have been split up overnight and people are desperately going between sites trying to find loved ones. If fighting intensifies further, there are very few places people can go for safety.”
Oxfam is aiming to reach about 230,000 people affected by this new crisis and since July has been responding to the needs of families in three camps near Goma. As of Tuesday the organization had helped 123,000 with clean water, sanitation services, and protection support. And public health teams have launched education campaigns to reduce the risk that waterborne diseases, such as cholera, could spread. But the largest of the camps, Kanyaruchina, where Oxfam has been building 700 latrines and 120 bathing stalls, is now deserted after people were forced to flee again.
For people of the eastern provinces, the violence is a grim reminder of how weak Congo’s national justice system is. Coupled with a lack of state authority and an ill-trained and poorly paid army, the consequence of that weakness has been decades of sporadic conflict triggered in part by ethnic tensions and disputes over land and resources. The danger and volatility make it very difficult for people to earn a living and have pulled many deeper into poverty.
“This war brings us extreme poverty and leave many killed,” a woman from Rutshuru in North Kivu told Oxfam. “Children no longer go to school and people flee to zones that are somehow safe. Those who return to their village to work their land to provide for their families are killed during clashes, or raped when a woman or girl is alone in the field.”
Oxfam is calling for an immediate halt to the fighting so that humanitarian aid can reach more civilians, especially those who have been displaced.
]]>Organized by the Alliance for the Defense of Rural Women’s Rights and Oxfam’s GROW campaign, the San Salvador event was an opportunity for women like Henríquez, a mother and small farmer, to present their demands to members of the National Assembly and government officials.
What Henríquez is fighting for is good and healthy food for her and her family, and a sustainable way of producing it.
“If I have food security, I have it all: a variety of healthy food, land, physical health—my children and grandchildren won’t fall sick because they eat healthy— and education,” said Henríquez. “To me, sovereignty is the guarantee we have to food security [and to] be the owners of our land, our lives.”
Thanks to the training she has received from different institutions, Henríquez now knows how to make organic fertilizer, conserve soil, and work with bees to make honey.
She also benefits from a government program that provides the poorest families with about 100 pounds of fertilizer and two pounds corn seeds. But from Henríquez’ point of view, that doesn’t add up to food security, because when the program ends, the situation will be the same as before. What rural women need, she said, are native seeds which will guarantee sustainability by not only producing crops, but a new round of seeds for planting the following season.
Seed variety isn’t her only worry. Small farmers like Henríquez also face severe challenges from increasingly unpredictable weather.
“This year we lost our crops because of the drought. Last year we lost the whole bean crop because of Tropical Depression 12E,” said Henríquez. That storm dumped five feet of rain in nine days. “I took a loan to invest again, and when this (the drought) happened, I was crying because I didn’t know how to pay back the loan. Thank God the bank came to study my case and canceled my loan.”
Despite the hurdles she and her fellow rural farmers are confronting, Henríquez is confident that all the work they do as part of Alliance for the Defense of Rural Women’s Rights will bear fruit.
“If we go back to using native seeds, we can produce more and more permanently,” she said.” If we have irrigation systems to store water for the dry season, if we have access to information to what is happening in our country—economy, education, health—access to knowledge about soil conservation and how to conserve the environment, than we will have everything we’re all longing for: a dignified live and health.”
Henríquez speaks with the authority of an empowered and independent woman. She is convinced that by speaking out and engaging in the fight for women’s rights, change will come.
“Even if I don’t get to see the changes I’m fighting for, others will, and that gives me great satisfaction,” she said.
]]>This October 16, World Food Day, Oxfam teamed up with other like-minded organizations to encourage people to think about food in a whole new way. Across the country and around the world, families and communities came together for conversations about where our food comes from, why fighting hunger is so important, and what we can do to create a fairer food system for everyone.
Oxfam America supporters like you played a major role in these efforts; in fact, your commitment and passion exceeded our expectations. As a way to say thank you for all that you did, here’s a quick look at what we accomplished together, by the numbers:
Inspired? Find more ways to take action for Oxfam in your community.
Around the capital city of Port-au-Prince and in the Region des Palmes, Oxfam has been distributing hygiene and cholera kits to people in need, while continuing to provide information on how to prevent the spread of the disease. In Artibonite, a rural region to the north that was hit hard by cholera when the first outbreak occurred, Oxfam is stepping up its prevention activities. It’s providing equipment to cholera treatment centers, distributing cholera kits to hundreds of families, and collaborating closely with the local authorities.
“Unfortunately, cholera will likely, at a minimum, be endemic in Haiti for years to come,” said Thomas Mahin, a water quality adviser to Oxfam America. “The history of cholera cycles in other countries is that when the outbreak goes from an epidemic to an endemic situation, the number of cases decreases significantly but the percent of cases that are children less than 5 years old goes up. So, while the number of cases will decline eventually, the most vulnerable populations—infants, pregnant women, etc.—will still be at significant risk. So, the total number of cases only tells part of the story.”
The rain Sandy dumped isn’t only affecting the potential for a cholera outbreak. In some areas of the country, rainfall was equivalent to about 50 percent of the yearly precipitation and destroyed houses, bridges, schools, and roads.
In the South-East region, Oxfam is working with local partners to evaluate damage to agricultural areas: Sandy was the third recent weather event to hit the region following, first, a drought and then tropical storm Isaac. The cumulative effects of these crises are devastating to small farmers. Oxfam has launched cash-for-work initiatives for more than 1,000 families. The income from that work can help people meet their basic needs.
]]>Oxfam is gearing up to respond to the flooding and potential for disease outbreaks.
“We are mobilizing all local organizations trained in cholera prevention to prepare a large campaign in the coming days,” said Oxfam’s Amelie Gauthier. “Oxfam is supporting local authorities—the Civil Protection Agency and the National Direction for Water and Sanitation in various localities in the Region des Palmes—providing them with transport, logistics and equipment for now. We are preparing hygiene kits, cholera prevention kits for distribution for some temporary shelters.”
Oxfam is launching an assessment in the department of Nippes—much of it affected by the heavy rain. At least two other departments have also been hit badly by the storm: Grande Anse and South. As of Friday, the country remained under a state of alert across all of its 10 departments.
“In one area in Croix-des-Bouquets (near the capital of Port-au-Prince), we spoke to several families who now live with 160 families—more than 500 people in a fire station,” said Gauthier. “There are pregnant women and young children as part of that one shelter.” She added that many homes have been flooded and families need basic relief items such as plastic sheeting and hygiene kits.
A lack of access to drinkable water and safe sanitation in some urban and rural areas is also cause for worry. Oxfam is monitoring some of those areas closely.
“We’re also concerned at initial reports of destruction of agricultural crops caused by Hurricane Sandy in the south,” Gauthier said. “The south of Haiti is already food insecure because of the drought and impacts of tropical storm Isaac. We’re following the situation closely as this will affect thousands of farmers for the planting season as well as school nutrition programs.”
Donate now to Oxfam's Haiti fund.
]]>Last year thousands voted via mobile phones for the winners of Tanzania's national competition, whose stories were shared with about 25 million people via TV and the media. This year’s winners will also be determined by public voting, and will be announced on World Food Day, October 16.
Below, Oxfam’s Mwanahamisi Salimu profiles one of Tanzania’s 15 Female Food Hero finalists, Sister Martha Waziri. Read about the other finalists on Oxfam’s East Africa blog.
Everywhere I travel in Tanzania I meet women who work the land, but are unable to own or inherit it because of cultural restrictions. In Kondoa district in Dodoma I met a remarkable woman, Sister Martha Waziri, who was determined to change this.
Now 45 years old, Martha began her campaign to reclaim land in 1984. As a young woman she began her calling in the Catholic Church, enrolling in Catholic schools but forced to drop out three times due to ill health. Disheartened and landless, and with no hope of inheriting land from her parents, she saw a possibility to claim a wide sand-ridden seasonal furrow on the border of her village.
The land was completely barren and none of the men wanted it. But not everyone shared 17-year-old Martha’s vision, and when she asked the local authority if she could use it, they laughed at her.
“I became an object of ridicule to other villagers, and when my first attempt to reclaim land failed it was a bonus to them,” she recalls.
Eventually, though, she managed to claim 18 acres of that land. As both a farmer and a pastoralist, she now cultivates 9.5 acres of this land, growing sugarcane, maize, sweet potatoes, cassava, bananas, and a variety of beans. She also rears eight goats and 26 chickens.
She has reaped the economic benefits of her initiative, but has also become a beacon of change in the village. More than 300 villagers, organized into five groups, have now emulated her.
Donasian Kassian, a fellow villager, told me: “When we joined Sister Martha in reclaiming sand-ridden furrows, people dubbed us mad. But 28 years ago this place was a huge useless canal. Today we eat sugarcanes, maize and beans from this land.”
Following her religious calling, Sister Martha has supported 12 orphans and vulnerable youth over the years. Her farms have secured food for her extended family and generated a reliable income to build 10 rooms that the orphans can call home, and from where they can pursue their dreams.
Sister Martha’s success has not been without challenges. She says her first experience of climatic changes was when her fishpond dried up as water levels in the area decreased. She says the land has become increasingly dry, affecting her banana farm most of all.
Sister Martha is not an agro-science expert. She doesn’t use high-tech machines. But this extraordinary woman from an ordinary rural community has made a substantial contribution to conserve her environment and made a remarkable difference in the lives of her fellow villagers. I cannot acknowledge her in any better way than to call her a Female Food Hero.
]]>“It is hard not to be able to feed your children,” says Adama Diallo. “You can’t be at peace. You can’t sleep at night.”
Diallo, who lives in the village of Tankanto Escale, Senegal, is no stranger to hunger. Each year in the run-up to the fall harvest, those who depend on agriculture experience a lean season, when the last of the stored food runs out and they must cope as best they can—reducing their meals to a minimum while they eke out an uncertain income from day labor, trading, and in some cases mining for flecks of gold.
But this year, the lean season in Senegal—as in much of the western Sahel—began months early, and the consequences have been harsh. More than half a year on a sparse diet of millet and rice has left many children severely and visibly malnourished. And farmers, many of whom have had to sell off their labor-saving equipment and draft animals to buy food, face the difficult task of cultivating crops while hungry and fatigued.
Diallo’s own story is not unusual: after the disastrous harvest of 2011, her stocks of food ran out quickly, and she resorted to a hand-to-mouth existence as a trader in the marketplace, beginning each day with no money and only borrowed goods to sell, and ending with—if she was lucky—enough food to get through another day.
“If the food is not sufficient,” she says, “we only give it to the children.”
Diallo’s struggles didn’t go unnoticed: Oxfam’s partner FODDE (in English, Forum for Sustainable Indigenous Development) included her in a program to distribute cash to the people most in need in this emergency. So recently she traveled to a credit union in the nearest large town, presented her cash voucher card and ID, and received enough money—provided by Oxfam—to feed a household of 10 people for a month (about $8 per person).
Why distribute cash rather than food during a food crisis?
It is a surprising fact that in the midst of a food crisis, marketplaces may be overflowing with food. In the Kolda market, for example, which serves Tankanto Escale, some local farmers – despite the crop failures—have managed to gather or grow a few items for sale. They ran out of rice months ago, but traders have filled that gap and many others by importing goods from other regions.
As long as food is available, there’s no need for an aid provider to undertake the costly and time-consuming process of shipping it in. Yet people who have lost their harvest—and with it their main source of income—may not be able to afford the food that’s there. For that, they need cash.
Cash payments quickly go to work in the local markets, benefiting not only the people who receive the money directly but also the local farmers and vendors they buy from.
And cash provides flexibility. A food distribution might involve fixed rations of beans and grains—the non-perishables that can travel long distances— but people who receive cash can buy a variety of foods, including eggs, fresh fruit, and vegetables. Furthermore, those who have pressing medical concerns can make the choice to spend some of their money on doctors and medicines.
So in southern Senegal and some of the other crisis-affected regions, Oxfam is focusing not on providing food but on providing the means to purchase the foods and critical services that are available locally.
Diallo used her first payment to buy rice, soap, and cooking oil. “Once we received the cash, there was a big change,” she says. “Before, we ate twice a day, but never enough. The children ate three times a day, but it never filled them. After the payment, there was enough for everyone.”
The money not only helped her meet immediate needs—it released her from the daily imperative of earning money in the marketplace, so she has had a chance to plant her fields. Which means that if this season’s promising rains continue, she will likely have a harvest in October or November that will help her get back on her feet.
“Now I have peace,” she said, “and I am sleeping well.”
Read blogs about Oxfam’s cash and public health programs in Senegal.
Read about Oxfam’s response to the food crisis throughout the western Sahel.
Donate now to the Sahel food crisis fund.
]]>What I saw in La Oroya made my head hurt even more: It is one of the most polluted cities in the world, primarily due to a metal smelting facility operating there since 1922.
I met with a range of people from the community who described the public health crisis. Lead pollution particularly was affecting virtually all the children living near the plant, most of whom had very high levels of it in their blood. My altitude headache was nothing compared to that.
Since then the owner of the plant, a company called Doe Run Peru (part of an American company called Renco Group), shut down the plant and has been trying to renegotiate the environmental clean-up commitments it made when it bought the plant in 1997. We are hearing that the government of Peru is allowing another company to operate the parts of the facility that they say can comply with environmental regulations. The groups working to defend the rights of people in La Oroya to live in a safe environment are hoping that whoever runs this plant will comply with all the environmental standards if and when it becomes fully operational again.
My colleagues and I have been working to find ways for the people of La Oroya to get their message out to people in power, so they can defend their right to live in a clean environment. On July 19th, they had a major success here in the US: a hearing before the House Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Human Rights.
Representative Chris Smith (R-NJ) organized the hearing. “Environmental damage in Peru is our concern, not just because we care about suffering people outside our borders – we absolutely do,” he said in his opening remarks. “But it is also our responsibility to make sure that our own companies aren’t at fault.”
Two people from La Oroya gave their testimony: Monsignor Pedro Barreto, the Archbishop of Huancayo, cited the environmental problems and raised the larger question about the purpose of economic development: “The Church is not opposed to mining or development, but it does ask the question: Development for whom? Mining for the benefit of whom? At what cost?”
Rosa Amaro also testified. She works with the Movement for Health in La Oroya (known as MOSAO), and has been threatened on numerous occasions for speaking out in favor of a cleaner environment. “Supporters of Doe Run have thrown stones at me, threatened to burn down my house, and threatened my life…When they see us in the street they shout ‘Death to MOSAO.’ We have no protection from these threats.” Her security concerns did not prevent her from traveling to Washington to testify.
To detail the toxic life people in La Oroya are leading, Dr. Fernando Serrano from the University of St. Louis delivered findings from studies that show people are living with pollution levels of the most toxic metals three to six times higher than the US average.
Keith Slack from Oxfam’s office in Washington, who has written extensively on mining-related conflicts in Peru, made recommendations for Peru’s government to improve respect for basic human rights and strengthen environmental standards. He urged the US government to support Peru’s defense of an $800 million lawsuit brought against it by Renco Group. “[The]US government should encourage all American companies operating in Peru and elsewhere in the region to ensure that they are following the highest possible human rights and environmental standards,” he concluded. “Their behavior is a reflection on the US as a whole.”
]]>On distribution day in the village of Louga, women and children sat patiently, waiting for their names to be called as workers carefully measured each family’s allotment. Here, every grain is precious. Though Oxfam has selected the most vulnerable villagers to receive the food—widows, divorcees, and people caring for orphans—in reality the sorely needed calories will be shared widely among many. It’s one of the survival strategies common in Louga, where the homes sit close together along dusty paths and the temperature soars to 104 degrees.
“Solidarity here in this community is very strong,” says Khadidja Idriss, a mother of six children. She shared with 10 other families some of the food she received on distribution day, which included 75 pounds of corn, 9 to 11 pounds of beans, a little more than two quarts of oil, and close to a pound of salt.
“My neighbors have virtually nothing either, but they will even feed my children if I’m out. We help each other, regardless of how little we have,” Idriss says. “This is how we survive.”
Before the distribution, Idriss , who suffers from increasing pain in her legs, had been struggling to find enough food for her family. Meals consisted of corn flour mixed with water, and a sauce made from leaves gathered by her children.
“The children often don’t manage to sleep and they cry because they are hungry,” said Idriss. “Sometimes I have no words of comfort for my children. I boil water with a bit of salt for them to drink, which will fill them up.”
But there is no comfort like food, and when Idriss learned that her family had been selected for the distribution, she could hardly wait to convey the news.
“I told my children straight away and they were so happy and joyful and haven’t talked about anything else since,” she said.
The day before the distribution, a neighborhood child, propped near the doorway of Adoaga Ousmane’s home, chewed on a pit from a piece of fruit . The fruit was long gone, but the chewing helped stave off hunger. For Ousmane, caring for a house full of children and grandchildren, hunger has been no stranger. Her family, too, was among those selected to receive the monthly rations. And like Idriss, her share went far beyond her own threshold.
“I shared the food I received with three other families,” said Ousmane. “I can’t eat my food while other people go hungry. We always share if we can. There is a strong feeling of solidarity in the village. I have to help others who are in need as they would help me if I asked.”
]]>That’s why an Oxfam America emergency response launched in La Pelota last October sought not only to meet people’s immediate needs, but to help them mitigate the risks of their community for the future.
When it rains hard, La Pelota is one of the first communities in the area to flood, in part because a vigorously growing plant called la ninfa clogs the local waterways. The plant is a sign of another problem people face: poor infrastructure for sanitation. Most families rely on pit latrines whose contaminants feed the growth of la ninfa.
In October, Tropical Depression 12-E hit. It rained for almost two weeks straight. On one side of La Pelota the lake overflowed, and on the other side its natural drain spilled its banks.
“It began to rain quite a lot. Little by little, the lake drained, but then the water level rose as it continued to rain,” said Juan Francisco Flores, a 32-year-old community member. “The lake doesn’t flow fast enough through the channel. The water backs up and that’s what floods the community… The stream was flooding on one side and the lake on the other. We were isolated.”
The response from the community to the flooding was well planned and evacuation was timely, due to preparedness work that had been done by Oxfam partner Fundación Maquilishuat (FUMA), in recent years. However, damage to crops was severe.
Together with FUMA and the World Food Programme, Oxfam America launched a food-for-work initiative that not only helped families in La Pelota survive in the first months after the emergency, but reduced the risk they would face in the future. FUMA and citizens of La Pelota decided to clean out the channel to allow the water to flow more easily and prevent flooding. Oxfam provided material to do the work, FUMA provided monitoring and technical assistance, and the families carried out the work.
The project provided people with 100 pounds of corn, 33 pounds of rice, 20 pounds of beans, and a gallon of cooking oil, in exchange for 80 hours of work a month.
“The food-for-work project has been well received. It was very effective to implement this project at this time of year, when people usually don’t have work,” says Sandra Quinteros of FUMA. “There’s been a selection process for the FFW program, with several criteria—that they lost at least 50 percent of their production; that they live on less than two dollars a day; that they have many children or older adults to care for; that they are day laborers; and that they are willing to work.”
The food-for-work project has been implemented in 99 poor communities like La Pelota, in 15 municipalities throughout El Salvador. A total of 3,800 families earned a three-month supply of corn, beans, rice, and oil for a family of five, enabling them to recover from their losses and now live in better prepared communities.
]]>On the edge of the Taffoga cooperative, in a clearing among the huge mango trees that populate the community, we are welcomed by about 30 women, who describe the horticultural work they are able to carry out with the support of Oxfam, through its local partner ATAD. In the vegetable plot they have planted cabbages, aubergines, gombo (a local vegetable), onions, and garlic. These will enable the women to improve the variety of their diet and they will be able to sell any surplus.
Ramata Zore stops for a few minutes to talk to us while her colleagues water and weed the plot. She is 25 and has 4 children to look after. And at the moment she is on her own, as her husband has gone to the Ivory Coast to look for work.
“The vegetable plot is a help to me, because what I get from it goes somewhere towards feeding my family,” she says. “If I sell some of the vegetables, I can buy millet, which is the staple part of our diet. Also, in these difficult times, we make a recipe based on millet with a few cabbage leaves, which the children love.”
But gardeners here face a daily struggle: Water.
“There isn’t enough water and the wells are drying up,” says Zore. “We’ve had to organize ourselves into two groups: one group does the watering one day and the other does it the following day. In fact…after a few hours of watering, the well is dry and we have to wait a while before we can fill up the buckets again”.
After we have been talking to her for a few minutes, we notice that the coming and going of the women up and down the rows is starting to slow. The four wells on the perimeter of the garden have dried up and the women are congregating around them with their buckets and watering cans, waiting for the water levels to rise again.
“I live in Taffogo and in spite of our having large fields for growing crops, we’ve only harvested four sacks of millet this year, compared with the 20 we can get in a normal year,” says Zore. “But it’s a long time since we had a normal year. Last year, the floods destroyed much of the harvest. We go from one catastrophe to another, either because of too much water or too little.”
“Before, when rain wasn’t in short supply, we had 15 small sheep and cattle,” Zore says. “But we’ve had to sell them all and have now only got one small goat left. As I’ve got nothing else, I’ll have to sell her to buy seeds for next season.”
How to feed her children is always on Zore’s mind.
“Often they tell me they’re hungry and all I can offer them is comfort,” she says. “If there’s something to eat, I give it to them, and if not, I ask the neighbors.”
“My dreams?” Zore asks, surprised at my question about her wishes for the future. “To have enough food to feed my family and a house built of bricks, instead of a shack like the one I live in now. I’d also like to keep up the vegetable plot for five years. Then, if I manage to find something else to do which will enable me to supplement my income, I’ll be able to start a small business. I want to carry on with the vegetable plot and earn money to help my children.”
Oxfam is aiming to help 1.2 million people across seven countries with programs that include cash transfers and cash-for-work initiatives, veterinary care for the livestock on which many families depend, and access to clean water and sanitation. We are also campaigning to change the root causes of this crisis. Find out how you can support our efforts.
]]>Many of these plants have been cultivated by Kichwa people for generations, but are in danger of disappearing as growers turn to cash crops like coffee or cacao instead. This shift to a single crop can leave farmers more vulnerable unpredictable rainfall caused by climate change, and more dependent on purchasing food from outside rather than growing it themselves—putting them at risk of hunger.
“Food prices are increasing. Sometimes we don’t have money for bread,” said Luz Sinarahua, who leads the group of women growers in Chirikyacu. “That’s why we’re glad to have the beans, yucca, and plantains from the garden.”
See a photo slideshow of the women and their gardens
Oxfam program officer Lorena Del Carpio said the ancestral Kichwa methods of harvesting and planting year-round can help people adapt to changes in the climate. “Indigenous people have important knowledge about how to work with the environment,” said Del Carpio. “[Their traditional way of] growing diverse crops helps ensure food for their families.”
The idea for the gardens came from listening to Kichwa women, who first raised concerns about the loss of their crops in an AIDESEP workshop designed to build women’s leadership and advocacy skills. These efforts are part of a larger Oxfam program that helps indigenous people in South America protect their cultural, political, and territorial rights.
In the future, “we want to make sure we have enough for food, [but] our main goal is to sell crops so we can increase our incomes,” said Sinarahua of the women’s plans. AIDESEP aims to organize a sellers’ fair where growers from these remote towns can exchange seeds and connect with potential buyers. And, eventually, they hope to expand the project to other communities.
To learn more about the traditional gardens and the women who grow them, see the article in OXFAMExchange magazine.
]]>