Cameroon - UN Women's Gender Road Project
A women’s cooperative is forming in the township of Yoko, Cameroon. It’s called SOCCOMAD and has 42 members, including four men, who joined as allies.
Tukuri Marie Chantal, 52 years old, is an active member. “Because of the road project, we decided to start a cooperative and to empower women in our village,” she says.
Guindong Jaqueline, 60, explains further: “We realized that the road was going to bring workers and the population will increase. Through the cooperative we can grow enough food and we will have a ready market to sell to.”
A small section of the road near the farm is already paved. Once the road is completed, women farmers will have easier access to bigger markets to sell their produce.
“Personally, I decided to join the cooperative to be united with other women. When I have a problem, I now have sisters who can stand by me,” says Seto Satou.
“Before, we were producing food only for our families; now we can grow food and sell in the market,” adds Chantal. “Through the cooperative we can also get partners, access to finance, seeds, and we can commercialize our products. But we need access to many markets, where we can sell the cassava. The cassava crop cannot be left in the ground too long, because it rots.”
The cooperative is not just about income, it’s also about solidarity. In this impoverished area where social protection barely exists, the cooperative has given women a support system that they never had before.
“For me, firstly, [the cooperative] gives me the spirit of solidarity and the sense of belonging to a group,” says Yonah Virginie. “It encourages me to work hard when I see other women working to become independent.”
The cooperative members help each other with a range of issues—from helping each other farm their crops if someone is sick, to talking to couples when there’s a family dispute and helping each other save.
Their message to other women is unequivocally about solidarity: “United, we are stronger. We can do bigger things when we are together.”
Background:
A 200-kilometre road (124 miles) project stretches between the townships of Batschenga, Ntui and Yoko, in central Cameroon. The road crosses farms, forests, water bodies and pastoral areas that sustain the mostly agrarian economy of nearly 40 villages and three towns.
The road, a basic infrastructure that many countries take for granted, literally shapes the lives and livelihood of the people living along it. It decides whether a small entrepreneur will get her products transported on time, and at what cost, and whether more people will come to a restaurant that another has invested in. It determines what markets a woman farmer can access and how often a working mother can visit her daughter who is studying in the city. The red dirt road, waiting for asphalt, will determine if food, income, job, healthcare, livelihood will come, when, and to whom.
UN Women’s “Gender Road Project”, funded by The Development Bank of Central African States and the Government of Cameroon, is aiming to reach at least 20,000 women by 2020, living in rural communities along this road, to prepare them for a better future and access to bigger markets once the road is built. The project teaches them financial and entrepreneurial skills, improved farming techniques and facilitates their access to public services and land rights.
Photo: UN Women/Ryan Brown
Read More: www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2019/3/feature-story-came...