Women who feed the world - Mothers of the Soil

Women show a young man from the city how to prepare the soil for planting in the Maisha Plus village in Tanzania/courtesy of Seven Torfin/Oxfam

 

Here is an article I wrote for the Indian magazine The Caravan about an innovative collaboration between Oxfam and the popular Tanzanian reality TV show Maisha Plus.

The idea was to celebrate the women who grow most of the food in developing countries and show viewers how important they are, how resourceful and creative they are, and how hard they work. 

I spent a week in the reality TV village, getting to know the 14 finalists and some of the young people, and watching them going about their daily activities. We would sit on mats they had woven and they would tell me their stories, which my lovely translator Abigail-Precious Ambweni, translated. I loved it!  Their stories moved me, inspired me, made me angry, made me happy – and I am sure the million of viewers who watched the show at night felt the same way.

Studies have shown that the best way to cut hunger in the world is to invest in women who farm small plots and ensure they have the same rights and access to resources as men. So let's do it!

Mothers of the Soil

 

A reality show turns its focus to women in villages

By Veronique Mistiaen | 1 February 2013

The latest season of Maisha Plus gave young contestants and viewers a taste of what women in Tanzania and across Africa go through to put food on the table. COURTESY SVEN TORFIN / OXFAM

 

THE LATE-AFTERNOON SUN bathed the small village in soft, golden light. With thatched huts scattered among palm trees, vegetable gardens, a well, and scrawny chickens scurrying about, it was the quintessential rural African scene. But a closer inspection revealed cables half-buried in the grey sand, and cameras hidden behind palm trees and shrubs.

We were in a make-believe village, built from scratch at a secret location in the Pwani region of Tanzania. The village was the set for Maisha Plus, a Big Brother-type television show, whose latest season was produced in collaboration with the international development charity Oxfam, and ran from October to December last year. Twenty-five young men and women from cities were competing in a standard ‘survival’ format show, but this season the show also had a special segment in which 14 women who farm small plots of land in rural Tanzania competed for the title of “Mama Shujaa Wa Chakula” (Female Food Hero). This segment was an extension of a show Oxfam had introduced the  previous year.

Oxfam estimates that their female food heroes show reached 25 million Tanzanians in 2011, through television, as well as through discussions on radio, social media and newspapers—even in remote villages, people gather at night in community centres to watch it. “The idea behind the show is to give young contestants and millions of viewers a taste of what women in Tanzania and across Africa go through to put food on their tables with limited resources and in the face of enormous challenges,” said Mwanahamisi Salimu, a coordinator with Oxfam. “It is an opportunity to push for them to have access to the same rights and resources as their male counterparts, and a way to scale up the voices of women farmers.”

The women contestants arrived in the village first, and stayed for two weeks, performing the tasks they would in their own daily lives—clearing land, planting vegetables, milking goats, fetching water, cooking cassava and building chicken coops. The young people, who joined the women at the end of the women’s stay, learned these skills from them over a week, before being left to survive on their own for the next eight weeks. Viewers voted winners from both groups, influenced as much by the contestants’ performance of the tasks as by their personalities and life stories.

In Tanzania, as in many African countries, women produce much of the food that feeds people. Few, however, own the land they farm or enjoy the same rights as men. In a pre-show interview to Oxfam and Maisha Plus, Tatu Abdi, a contestant from the Tanga region said, “Women are treated as tractors, but they have to treat their husbands like angels.”

The 14 women on the show were selected from among more than 7,000 applicants from across the country, and were in many ways typical of the millions of women who farm small plots of land. But the participants were also chosen for their unique life experiences and the challenges they had overcome. Eline Olotu Orio from the Kilimanjaro region, for example, managed to fight her community’s deep-seated patriarchal tradition and acquire a piece of land when she was only 20 years old. Nearly two decades later, this land supports her family, and Orio continues to improve her farm with innovative ideas—among these is a metal granary to protect her produce from the region’s scourge of rodents, which can eat up as much as 30 percent of a farmer’s crops. Another contestant, Emiliana Aligaesha from the Kagera region, couldn’t feed her nine children on her primary-school teacher’s salary, and so turned to agriculture. She now grows coffee, banana, beans and maize, and supplies quality seedlings to other villagers. Dorah Myinga from the Southern Highlands took a loan to buy a tractor—a step unheard of for a woman, let alone a widow. She now tends her 12-acre farm, and also earns money by renting her tractor out to other villagers.

To prepare for the show, a team from Oxfam and Maisha Plus spent a month criss-crossing the country to document the lives of these and other finalists. In the process, they uncovered some of the issues that hinder women’s progress: they often don’t own the land they work on, they struggle to get fair access to markets, they lack proper training and adequate tools, and they often face threats of violence. In almost all the villages, women complained that they were the ones seeding, planting, weeding and ploughing crops; but when harvest time came, men took over—sometimes selling the crops and keeping all the profits. In Orio’s village, women talked of a horrifying “season of rape”—a time when maize has grown so tall that some men hide in the fields, and attack, rape and even kill women. “The weeding season has become the raping season,” said one woman from the village during an open forum with Oxfam. “Since no men tend to the farms and women’s farms are very far from villages, rapists take advantage of that. We buried a victim a couple of weeks ago.”

Women Farmers in Tanzania - I'm a farmer, get me out of there!

Women farmers at the Maisha Plus Village teach youngsters from the city how to grow and prepare their food/Sven Torfinn

I spent a few days in a typical African village in Tanzania with thatched huts, water well, goats and scrawny chickens scurrying about, but this village was actually built from scratch at a secret location in the Pawni region. It was the set for a Big Brother-type show organized by the international development charity Oxfam and the popular Tanzanian reality TV show Maisha Plus. Fourteen women who farm small plots of land in rural Tanzania and 26 youths from the cities competed for the titles of "Mama Shujaa Wa Chakula" (woman food hero) and youth food hero.
 
The idea was to give young contestants and millions of viewers a taste of what women in Africa go through to put food on the table with limited resources and in the face of enormous challenges. It was also a rare opportunity to celebrate them, put farming and gender issues on the agenda and force politicians to listen.

Here is a short blog post I've written for the Economist:

Farming in Tanzania

I'm a farmer, get me out of here

Dec 18th 2012, 9:57 by V.M. | DAR ES SALAAM

STARS of most reality television shows spend their time nibbling earwigs, sunbathing and bickering. Those taking part in a Big Brother-style show recently broadcast in Tanzania, however, had a more productive experience.

Fourteen farmers, all women, and 26 urban youngsters were thrown together in a specially constructed village under near 24-hour TV surveillance. The women set daily tasks from their own lives—growing vegetables, looking after cows or fetching water—which the teenagers had to complete in order to survive. The farmers were given farming tips and got to talk to politicians and policy-makers in the "diary room".

In Tanzania, as in many African countries, women produce much of the food that feeds their people, but few own their land. "Women are treated as tractors, but they have to treat their husbands like angels," said one of the contestants.

The Women Food Heroes competition, run by Oxfam and "Maisha Plus", a popular Tanzanian reality TV show, gave the young contestants and its viewers a taste of what women in Tanzania endure to put food on the table. It was a rare opportunity to promote women’s voices and celebrate their contribution, says Mwanahamisi Salimu of Oxfam. It was also a chance to push for them to have access to the same kind of support and rights already available to men farmers, she continues. It showed that small-scale agriculture is a sustainable way of feeding the country.

Broadcast nightly on the biggest national network and promoted on social media, radio and newspapers, the programme reached more than half the population. In the countryside, people gathered in community centres to watch it. Its popularity has forced politicians to talk about farming, a subject about which they are usually fairly quiet.

The winner, Sister Martha Mwasu Waziri from Dodoma, who won $6,300 to buy farming equipment, says she wants to turn her farm—which she built on a scrap of wasteland—into a demonstration farm to show others what they can achieve. "I learned so much here and that is more important to me than winning the competition," says Mary Kamwaka Maumbi, another finalist. "I’ve learned how to do a crop calendar, when to start breeding my pigs and when to inoculate them, how to get my produce to the market and what to do with my money.  I’ll put everything into practice and will show others how to do it.  It will have an impact on my whole village."

Women Farmers Grow Food and Peace

-->

In periods of affluence, most people get along fine – even when they are from different ethnic or religious backgrounds, but when resources are scarce, former friends and neighbours often turn into foes. We have seen this too many times throughout history. Across the world, food insecurity fuels conflict and in turn, conflict fuels food insecurity, creating a vicious circle.  For example, when in 1994, genocide engulfed Rwanda, this human catastrophe was fuelled by ethnic hatred, but economic crisis, poverty and hunger also played their part.

This vicious circle is found around the world and women can play a vital role in breaking it. One in seven of the world's population is malnourished. The UN Food Agency estimates that by giving equal rights to women farmers – meaning giving them the same access as men to productive resources such as land and credit – 100 to 150 million people would be lifted out of hunger.

The charity, Women for Women International, which aids women who have lived through wars around the world, has launched an innovative programme, helping women to put food on the table, earn an income and move from victim to productive member of society.  The Commercial Integrated Farming Initiative (CIFI) programme trains women in organic farming techniques and food production in Rwanda, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Nigeria, South Sudan and Afghanistan.

To find out more or sponsor a woman, click here and watch this video:

-->