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23 December 2003
Real answers
An agricultural recovery project in Chata is yielding a lot of success.
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Esther waters sweet potato vines by hand.
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Malawi’s food shortage of 2000-2002 shook the Chata community, with some people so desperate they ate grain they had kept for seed.
Esther Chilenje, a widow with five children, was one of those affected, however three years later she has a very different story to tell.
As a participant in Chata ADP’s agriculture recovery project, Esther received maize seeds and sweet potato vines. She planted half a hectare in sweet potatoes with encouraging results, harvesting eight oxcarts full of tubers.
Realising it would be difficult to sell them all, she bartered some, managing to get 17 x 50kg bags of maize through this process alone. She also sold some of the sweet potatoes to traders, making approximately MK7000 (NZ$103).
“I used the money to buy school uniforms for my children and clothes for me,” says Esther. “I also bought a two acre [0.8 hectare] garden so I could extend my cultivation area. We used the rest of the money to buy household items.”
Meanwhile, Esther’s maize crop was also doing well. She made compost manure using dung from livestock around her home and when she could afford it, she also bought top dressing fertiliser. The result was five oxcarts of maize, about 6.2 tonnes of grain.
“I stored the maize in my granary and will use some of it to exchange with labour, to prepare my land for the next cropping season,” says Esther. “When maize prices have stabilised I will sell some to pay school fees for three of my children who are in secondary schools.”
Esther has raised 26 nurseries of sweet potato vines so she can plant a wider area. If she can find a market for them, she plans to sell the rest of the vines. She also intends planting an acre of cassava, which is a drought-resistant crop, unlike maize. She has already learnt how to process and use cassava and sweet potatoes in a variety of dishes.
Esther uses a watering can to irrigate her large garden, however in the next phase of the agriculture project, World Vision will teach farmers simple and effective irrigation technologies, such as canals and treadle pumps.
On her own, Esther had struggled to make sure her children could stay in school and have the basics of life. She admits that before she became involved in the project she did not have any maize seed to plant and that the project was “a real answer to an issue that had been bothering me for a long time.”
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Chata project profile
CHATA STORY ARCHIVE
2008
Plenty to smile about
Zakeyo’s farm
Snippets
HopeChild
Counting down
2007
Model village
Snippets
2006
A glass of fresh water
Sweet
Snippets
Rabbits, rabbits everywhere!
2005
Snippets
Food security
2004
Don’t adjust your set
Snippets
2003
Real answers
Trees for life
Snippets
Beans ‘n’ spuds
Thinking outside the square
No kidding
Cassava miracles
Hunger & cholera
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