The early rains that poured consistently at the beginning of the planting season generated a sense of hope for the people of Nsanje, a drought prone district in the southern part of Malawi. For years, the district has been receiving scanty rains, leaving its people with little and to some even nothing to eat.
In the past successive seasons, the rains had been either late or not enough to support growth of crops to maturity. However, the signs of good rains prompted the people from the district to plant all the seeds they had fearing to lose out on the favorable weather. But as the season progressed, the rains disappeared and in its turn, came the usual blistering heat that scolded the life from their crops.
“We had a poor harvest in the previous season and were banking our hopes on the good rains,” says Esnart Dumpwa from Mwandizawa village in Nsanje. “Our food supplies were low and this forced us to eat sparingly because we knew that the worst was to come if the next crop was to fail again,” she adds.
Immediate need for food As a grandmother to eight orphans and widowed for some years now, Esnart says the drought made her have sleepless nights because she had no idea where the next meal to feed her big family would come from, “I had to do menial jobs to get something on the table but at my age it was proving to be difficult,” says Esnart whose grandchildren are all of school age.
As hunger and despair loomed over her family, she received word of invitation from the village chief to a community meeting that would change her life, “I was invited to a community meeting and upon arrival I learnt that I was selected to be one of the beneficiaries to a seed project for those whose crops did not do well,” says Esnart.
Though she was pleased with the news, her immediate needs for that time was food, but having an improved seed variety for replanting gave her hope. Getting certified millet seed is a challenge in Malawi. With maize being the dominating staple food, millet and other crops are overlooked to the great disadvantage for the people from areas such as Nsanje and surrounding areas where the climate is hot and dry.
Through the ECHO funded food security project, Esnart received four kilograms of certified millet and sorghum seed to replant in her field.
The timely intervention of seed starter pack has enabled Esnart to harvest 12 bags of millet and 6 bags of sorghum, each weighing 50kgs, “The project has helped me a lot as I now have food for my family and can afford to help other relatives in need,” says Esnart
Enough food for six months Like Esnart, the Kam’bwembe family from the neighbouring village of Chithumba were also victims to unpredictable rains. They did not harvest much from their farm and the family was on the verge of starvation.
“We didn’t know that we would be part of the project. We were invited to the chief’s house and he told us that the community had chosen us to receive sorghum and millet seeds,” says Chrissie Kam’bwembe adding, “I think they saw that we are a hardworking family and it was the weather that was failing us and possibly they thought we deserved another chance because we had no seeds to replant.”
Chrissie’s husband, Yasmin says that during the time they received the seeds, they had no food and the temptation was very big to eat the starter seeds, “We knew that it would be a mistake to eat the seeds as it is difficult to have millet and sorghum certified seeds,” he says.
After planting, the Kam’bwembe’s had a good harvest. “We harvested eight bags from the same piece of land where we used to harvest one or two bags,” says Yasmin adding, “We have kept some seeds for the next planting season. The project has helped us a lot as we now have enough food for the coming six months and also have seeds for the next planting season.”
By Joseph Scott, Communications Officer, DCA Malawi