Life in Zambia: village stay in rural zambia (sept 14

As part of my in-country training, I had the fortunate opportunity to stay in a rural village with a traditional African family for one week. I stayed in a village 45 minutes from the town of Kalomo (4 hours south of Lusaka) called Siaamambwa.

The farmer that I had the fortunate opportunity stayed with was named Tangson Sialanga. Tangson has 2 wives, 8 children, 1 child he inherited from a cousin, and 1 granddaughter. On top of taking care of his 12 member household, Tangson works very hard on his farm and plays many leadership roles inside the community.

Tangson is considered a lead farmer. He volunteers his time on many committees to help other less fortunate farmers: lead farmer for CARE, executive member of the village HEIFER project (donor cattle distribution), chair person for the Home Care Project, and just a recognized overall leader in the community whom people turn to for advice. Tangson has also worked closely with other EWB volunteers, Thulasy B. and Jon Beale, in the past through CARE.

Beneath the leadership and status, Tangson still struggles and faces the many constraints typical smallholder farmers do all over sub-Saharan Africa. Tangson and many farmers around the area work very hard to take care of their cattle (and other animals), grow maize (corn), vegetables (like tomatoes, green beans, sweet potato, rape) but face many obstacles with their agricultural operations to sustain a decent livelihood:

Lack of sustainable access to agricultural inputs (seeds, fertilizer, agricultural technology)
Lack of productivity-increasing agricultural technology for production (cultivation equipment, low-cost irrigation technologies e.g. treadle pumps)
Lack of access to natural resources (e.g. bodies of water for irrigation)
Lack of market information to determine demand and prices for different crops
Lack of transportation to deliver crops and thus face losses
Lack of connection to external markets
Continued dependency on donors
Exploitation by middleman purchasers
Some more vulnerable farmers lack food security

Despite these challenges, the community remains happy and optimistic. A big pillar for rural farming communities are their abundance and wealth of social capital. Reliance on relationships with other community members is critical to their livelihoods during good and tough times (e.g. droughts). When they lack output markets, they rely on each other’s generosity, sense of community and kinship for support.

After living in the urban centre of Lusaka for 2 weeks, this past week in the “bushes” was an amazing learning experience. Below are some photos documenting my experience: