Sustainable livelihood
Support for Koro women as they turn to other farming methods
ON Koro Island, it is evident that agricultural development is critically important to improving food security and nutrition for the people. It is now thriving with agricultural activities six years after the deadly Category 5 Severe Tropical Cyclone Winston that caused widespread destruction claiming lives in the process.
For the past three years, the Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) Fiji has been on the ground to help with the development and restoration of the island through its Learning Environmental Adaptation and Development (LEAD) project focused on climate change adaptation and mitigation community-centred actions with emphasis on capacity building for climate smart agricultural techniques and diversified green income generation activities.
Through the project, four demonstration farms for the farming clusters on the island were set up — where smart agriculture and organic farming practice, which they learnt from the Climate Smart Agriculture training exercises, were put into practice for food security and sustainable livelihood. Sales of these products is helping boost the local Koro economy.
The project places special emphasis on women empowerment with the women groups in the 14 communities involved in climate change and mitigation activities. They work in the farming clusters thus increasing the quantity and diversity of food, driving economic transformation; and providing the primary source of income for many on the island.
“The project has opened our eyes to venture out into other methods of farming. We used to focus on planting root crops and yaqona because they were our source of income and we tend to ignore the importance of being food secure,” Va Cokanauto of Nasau said.
“Through the project, we learnt climate smart agriculture enabling us to plant more vegetables — even new ones were introduced such as carrots, capsicum, cauliflower and bhindi. For our cluster in Nasau, we help our men in maintaining our farms because we are benefitting a lot from it.
“Women tend to worry about our daily food, but that is no longer the case because we have abundance of vegetable supplies from our gardens for our daily consumption.”
Mrs Cokanauto said their farm had also enabled them to earn income through the sale of their vegetables.
“Apart from being food secure, we are also earning income from the sale of these vegetables. We usually run out of supplies whenever we sell.”
Mrs Cokanauto said the Vunisalato cluster were also blessed with a bio-digestor system through the project where the women’s club received a cooking stove to be used with the clean gas generated from the bio-digestor.
“Our plan is now to open up an eatery by the roadside where we utilise our farm produce and our cooking facility in order to earn more income for our group. We, the members of the Vunisalato Women’s Group, are grateful to ADRA and European Union for bringing this project to Koro because it helps sustain our livelihood.”
Through this demo farm, members of the Vunisalato Cluster earn money from the weekly sale of their harvest for their clan while also contribute to their food and nutrition security.
They have identified this activity as a resilient system that is good for business, for their livelihoods and the environment.
The circular economy is a system solution framework that tackles global challenges like climate change, biodiversity loss, waste, and pollution.
With no chemical used, this farm boasts the use of organic liquid fertiliser from the bio digestor that is equally distributed in the farm through the drip irrigation system using gravity force installed by ADRA Fiji.