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Teaching poor farmers better ways to produce poultry and vegetables helps them increase their incomes and improve their families’ living conditions. Through farmers’ field schools, small-scale producers learn new methods and share useful experiences, joining in groups to make the most of their agricultural potential. Two IFAD-funded programmes support more than 200 farmers’ field schools in Zanzibar, working to empower small-scale farmers to overcome poverty.

Over centuries, the Zanzibar Archipelago, also known as the Spice Islands, has been an important trading centre, where many types of commodities such as ivory and gold, mainly from the Tanzanian mainland, were traded on the flourishing local market and also found their way to foreign markets.

Although the islands have been a magnet for trade, the profits have not benefited many islanders because the key business players were foreigners, mainly from Oman and other Arab countries. To date, a large proportion of the population of the archipelago, which is off the coast of East Africa and part of the United Republic of Tanzania, remains poor. According to the Zanzibar Poverty Reduction Paper Progress Report of 2002/2003, poverty levels are still high among various socio-economic groups, including small-scale farmers in rural areas and people in urban areas who are engaged in informal sectors.

Statistics from the report show that the maternal mortality rate is high, at 377 deaths per 100,000 women, while the infant mortality rate is 83 per 1,000 births, and the mortality rate for children under five is 114.3 out of 1,000. Life expectancy is 48 years on average and may be even lower as a result of the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

These factors indicate that poverty is a majorconcern in Tanzania, as in other developing countries, and it needs to be fought on all fronts. With the help of the Revolutionary Government of Zanzibar, working with partners in development such as IFAD, farmers in Zanzibar are looking into all possible solutions to combat poverty.

One way to engage for development is poultry farming. Farmers in Zanzibar are now practising a modern method of poultry farming that is more profitable than the traditional freerange method.

The free-range method allows chickens to roam about freely to search for food, and it does not provide proper housing and feed for them. “Because the chickens are poorly managed, the result is a 60 per cent loss, which leads to lowpoultry production. Consequently, farmers have been losing a substantial amount of the income they would earn if they applied a better method, like the one now being introduced,” says Zaki Khamis, coordinator for the Agricultural Services Support Programme and Agricultural Sector Development Programme - Livestock (ASSP/ASDP-L). IFAD funds support the programmes, which work to improve farmers’ livelihoods.

One of the approaches that the programmes use to help farmers is the formation of farmers’ groups known as farmer field schools (FFS), which each have 15 to 20 members. By the end of 2008, the ASSP/ASDP-L established 217 farmers’ field schools, with a total membership of 4,192 farmers.

Members of a farmers’ field school engage in a type of farming activity that depends on the type of crop grown in the area. Some schools are involved in cultivating bananas, paddy, cassava or vegetables, while others are engaged in livestock husbandry. More than half (56 per cent) of the farmers constituting the working farmers’ field schools are women. “Most of these farmers’ field schools are led by women, in an effort of the ASSP/ ASDP-L in Zanzibar to ensure the high participation of women in economic activities,” says Zaki.

Zaki explains that members of the farmers’ groups are given training on better farming practices. The training is offered by facilitators who are professional agricultural extension officers working with the ASSP/ASDP-L, and it ranges from the management of farming activities to the selection of better seeds that will yield a good harvest.

But he points out that poverty is still a major challenge and that most farmers cannot conduct their agricultural activities as they would like to. “As a programme, we are looking into a number of ways to support them not only technically, but also by linking them with an institution providing credit facilities, so they can expand their farming activities.”

Mwashamba Alhaji is a poultry farmer. She also heads a farmers’ group named Nguvu Sawa, literally ‘Equal Opportunity for All’, based in the outskirts of Stone Town of Zanzibar, in a place called Jumbi. “For years I have been practising a free-range system, which I now realize was a waste of time and resources. I did not make as much profit as I am now earning through the use of improved poultry farming technology,” she says.

“Under the old method, if you wanted to sell your chickens it was difficult to catch them. But under the new system, the chickens are partially confined so it is easier to manage them.

Likewise, if you keep them free range there are a lot of disadvantages, such as vermin, theft and even disease transmission,” says Mwashamba.

Her neighbors have become aware of the good income she is earning from poultry farming. They, too, have started to adopt the new method. “I organized my neighbors into a group, and collectively we gathered building materials for our poultry house, which serves as a training centre for the group where we learn new farming practices and share skills with others,” she says.

Mwajina Hassan Nassib, the wife of a retired soldier, grows vegetables at her farm in Kitope, about 20 km north of Zanzibar Town. Her farm plot is about 1 hectare. She grows tomatoes, amaranth, onions, eggplants and other produce. She sells her produce locally, to individual consumers and nearby hotels.

She is one of the farmers who have benefited from the training offered by ASSP/ASDP-L through farmers’ field schools. And she is not alone in enjoying the fruits of programme initiatives, as her neighbours have also adopted the new farming methods.

Speaking to the members of the IFAD Tanzania country team, who visited her farm recently, Mwajina said that the programme’s training in good vegetable farming practices has enabled her to perform her farming activities in a better way. “I am earning more income than I earned before. I can now pay school fees for my children and I am able to support other extended family members.”

Mwajina also keeps a dairy goat, a project she started recently with the capital she earned by selling vegetables. Mwajina said that her two activities are interconnected. From the dairy goat project she obtains manure for her farm, which means she does not have to buy industrial fertilizer. She earns money by selling vegetables, and she can use some of that money to buy medicines and feed for her goat. “In this way, each of the two projects depends on the other and, above all, the projects are all mine.” This shows clearly that women who are empowered have a significant role to play in the development process.

Mwajina says that marketing produce is not a problem, as the market is not saturated. But she faces some challenges. One is the scarcity of a reliable source of the water she needs during the dry season to irrigate her farm. “I sometimes use tap water for irrigation but it is too expensive, as I have to pay a monthly bill for water. And that reduces the profit margin on the produce.”

Whatever the challenges they face, smallholder farmers in Zanzibar are now meeting them with a smile. The impact of the efforts of the ASSP/ASDP-L is clear, as the community becomes aware of the benefits that may be realized by applying lessons learned from training in methods of poultry and vegetable farming. “It is so promising to see that the knowledge learned in the farmers’ field schools is being adopted and widely shared by a large proportion of farmers,” says Zaki, commenting on the positive impact of the existing farmers’ field schools.