Women Farmers Unite In Sudan

Rural women in Sudan face a triple crisis of poverty, environmental degradation, and armed conflict. Many are struggling to provide enough food to keep their families from starving. Mothers often go hungry to ensure that their children can eat. Despite this sacrifice, the United Nations estimates that more than 40% of children under age five in Sudan suffer from malnutrition and girls are more likely to die in childbirth than complete primary school.

The effects of global climate change are wreaking havoc in Sudan and other places in Africa, where intermittent droughts and floods are destroying crops and making farmers’ traditional knowledge obsolete. Many of these farmers are women, who grow and harvest the majority of food crops in Sudan. Yet, the government's farm aid programs traditionally exclude women, denying them credit and agricultural inputs, such as seeds and fertilizer.

Ongoing warfare in Darfur has caused millions of people to flee and settle elsewhere, creating a need to grow more food on soil that’s been depleted by climate change and stretching the meager resources of poor farming communities to the limit.

Many organizations are working together to help women farmers so that they can grow the food their families need to survive. Unlike emergency food aid, these programs give women the tools, resources and technical assistance they need to sustain their families for the long haul. They also provide women farmers with seeds and supplies, including donkeys and plows.

The impact of these programs is:

•   Hunger is alleviated and nutrition and health improve as women gain the resources they need to grow and produce food.

•   By working together to grow crops, participants build a network of women farmers who can share resources and work to boost their economic status over time, improving conditions for themselves and their families not just today, but well into the future.

•   The women’s improved economic status and organizing skills enhance their decision-making power within their communities and their capacity to demand human rights for themselves and their children.

•   Cooperative farms have increased their agricultural yields, enabling them to boost food security and generate income from surplus crops.

•   Women have pooled their income to invest in local development projects that build the long-term sustainability of their farming communities.

Many participants are using their increased incomes to pay for their daughters’ educations, breaking the cycle of poverty and increasing the chances for further political, economic and social empowerment.  WomenTeachingWomen has helped in these efforts by providing business training and access to small loans for these women.  Agricultural training and starting small farm businesses has changed the lives and futures of women farmers in the Sudan.