Jun
I recently worked with the organisation Farm Africa, in Babati in the Nou Forest area of Tanzania, photographing their projects with honey production and sesame seed farming. Farm Africa works with small holder farmers to reduce poverty and improve food security by increasing household incomes.
Traditional livelihoods of felling trees to sell as timber and charcoal has reduced the forest at a rate of 300,000 hectares each year. Farm Africa has been introducing more profitable and sustainable enterprises, like beekeeping.
As part of the trip, a group of ladies from the food industry headed up by Judith Batchelar OBE, Director of Sainsbury’s Own Brand, took on the challenge of “The Big Beehive Build”. They spent the week constructing beehives for a number of local communities. The girls worked extremely hard and efficiently.
Farm Africa’s sesame seed project is now in its second phase, working directly with
920 “model farmers” (40 farmers per village) who passed on project knowledge and skills to other “adopter farmers.”
Using this approach, the project reached 5520 farmers in total, with the additional aim that these farmers would further spread their knowledge to others in the region.
For more information and to see more pictures
https://www.photo-banks.com/farm-africa/
http://www.j-sainsbury.co.uk/blog/2015/06/how-many-women-does-it-take-to-make-a-beehive/
