By SENIORL ANZU
The right to food is a universal right and rural women all over the world are aware that one has to produce healthy and quality food in an amount sufficient to feed their households, communities and countries. All measures must therefore be taken to give women farmers and farmers the opportunity to produce enough food for all. Furthermore, it is necessary to support women farmers in their work by giving them the means to produce and sell food.
This was the message of women farmer members of the International Federation of Agricultural Producers (IFAP) and Papua New Guinea Women in Agriculture Development Foundation (PNGWiADF) last Monday, October 15 on World Rural Women's Day 2007.
Women farmers and groups in different parts of the world celebrated the day with different activities. In PNG, Lae was the venue but the celebration occurred a day later coinciding with the 2007 World Food Day.
Interim President of PNGWiADF Maria Linibi therefore joined Karen Serres, chair of IFAP Committee of Women Farmers, to encourage governments to take all the appropriate measures. They said growing food to feed some six billion plus people on a continuous basis was a challenge women farmers are ready to meet but hey must be given a profitable selling price.
Mrs Linibi said PNGWiADF is set up to facilitate, develop and implement program and projects for women and girl farmers from subsistence level of production to semi-commercial and commercial food producers. The foundation is also striving to promote and provide opportunities for rural employment and income for the bulk of the population.
Rural women from around the country showed the support for this cause and the establishment of the foundation by joining Mrs Linibi in Lae last Tuesday to commemorate the World Food Day. It was the initiative of the PNGWiADF that for the first time, rural women in PNG took lead to stage a world known annual occasion. The theme for the event was "The Right to Food".
Women from East and West Sepik, Milne Bay, Southern Highlands, Mt William in Simbu, Central, Western Highlands, Morobe, among others, flocked the Alan Quartermain Hall of the National Agricultural Research Institute (NARI) for the event. Not just that, members of the Australian Women in Agriculture, led by former President Cathy McGoman, joined the PNG counterpart. They came from Queensland, Victoria and Tasmania.
The one-day occasion also marked the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty.
While many come to see and hear from the occasion, women from Sepik, Milne Bay and Mt William participated with displays of their food produce and other locally made goods. Beside their displays were African yam, bananas, watermelons and taros showcased by Mutzin mothers from Markham and the floriculture group from Bubia and Lae. Adding flavor were demonstrations by Ramu Agri Industry's forestation program and the various displays by NARI on food crops, livestock and aquaculture. The NARI displays also had different menus from local food which the World Food Day participants had the chance to taste.
Mrs Linibi said the vision of PNGWiADF was to promote and strengthen women's participation in integral human development programs and to promote equal participation of women in agricultural, livestock and other natural resource development activities to improve and enhance their status through economic development.
"We recognize also that there is a need to organise and develop skills, tools and instruments to develop and promote the 80% of the population that are involved in food production to maintain peoples food needs in PNG", Mrs Linibi said.
Her message was supported by MPs for Finchaffen and Markham. Speaking during the occasion, Finchafen MP Theodore Zurenuoc said mothers are true producers of food and their work carry the country and the life of its population forward. He said agriculture is important as any sector and the work of women should be central to any strategy for the development of this country. Markham MP Koni Ingua shared the same sentiments, adding that the hard work of mothers feed the households, families, the country and the world as a whole. Mr Ingua also highlighted that PNG is naturally blessed with organic food produces; thus families should feed more on local and fresh food instead of relying too much on imported foods. He also announced that he has allocated funds to the National Development Bank to create an agriculture or credit scheme for women and village farmers from Markham to boost their agricultural production.
Mrs McGowan said food was important for men, women, community, country and the world. And people who grow food held develop PNG through food, particularly women. She added that women grow food and feed the family and the children. They support children to grow healthy, go to school and become strong and powerful.
The Australian farmer said food produced by farmers is exported and makes a country wealthy, and adds to the growth domestic product. She said if people of PNG in the country areas have food, then people in the cities who don't have gardens also have food. And when people in cities have food, they can be able to work. She said PNG produces good quality food which can also be exported.
"We in Australia love what PNG grows for food, we love your taros, sweet potatoes, brocollies, pawpaw, mangoes and more. We love them and would like you to grow more and export to Australia so that we can eat a lot of PNG food."
But women farmers did not isolate themselves from men as producers too, if not, supporters in food production. Mrs Linibi said women farmers also wish to highlight the importance of helping and supporting men and women who produce food. NARI Director of Research Dr Sergie Bang stressed that NARI as an agricultural research and development institute, through the institutionalization of gender equality, does recognize work both men and women farmers do to produce food in PNG.
"We also work hard to support mothers in agriculture, just like we would support fathers.
In NARI we have gender equality as a guiding principle," Dr Bang said.
Dr Bang also said that the PNG population is growing at nearly 4% and the rate of agricultural productivity is 1.5%. Therefore, he said, food consumption is high and people need to cultivate more land and produce more food and even tap into commercial agriculture. He said NARI is developing technologies and information to help farmers improved their food production and productivity and enhancing all becoming prosperous.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation, women produce more than 50% of the food cultivated on the planet. In Africa, more than 80% of food is produced by women while it is 60% in Asia and 30 to 40% in South America. Majority of the poor of the planet live in rural areas with 70% of the poor in rural areas are women and their principal resource is agriculture.
Mrs Linibi said rural women strongly recommend that practical actions be taken to promote food production. She added that one must be able to adapt production tools in order to increase the volume and improve the quality of food produced to make farming easier, to open up production in harsh environments and to mitigate the damage to farmer's health.
Meanwhile, Mrs Linibi said the Lae occasion was the beginning of PNGWiADF's combined celebration and the foundation will commemorate every year. This year's event was supported by Ramu Agri Industries, NARI and Trukai Industries Limited. The World Food Day was also observed in Port Moresby, Wewak, Banz in Western Highlands and some other centers.
More than 150 countries around the world observed the World Food Day this year, organising special events, conferences, contests, sports activities and a global candlelight vigil on "The Right to Food". The main ceremony was held at the FAO headquarters in Rome.

 

 

 

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