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Fighting rural poverty is a multifaceted challenge. It is about increasing the incomes of poor rural people, and providing them with access to safe water, health and education. It is about transferring knowledge and know-how. And equally important, it is about implementing policies that empower people to overcome poverty themselves. An IFAD-funded project is making headway on all these fronts in Mozambique.

Have you ever wondered where the cabbages, potatoes, tomatoes and green beans sitting on supermarket shelves come from? In Mozambique if you shop at Shoprite, Africa's largest food retailer, which has operations in 16 countries, you'll be buying vegetables produced locally by small-scale farmers.

In an interview with “RAI Tg3 – Donne” taped while attending the 30th session of IFAD's Governing Council in Rome, Mozambique Prime Minister Dr. Luísa Dias Diogo discusses the role of women in African society.
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The PAMA (Portuguese acronym for Agricultural Markets Support Project) was developed to support the implementation of the government's major economic reforms launched during the 1990s, including the commercialisation of smallholder farming through better access to markets and improved linkages with private sector operators.

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The Oxfam-supported Women's Coalition wins a hard-fought victory in Mozambique to reform family law and win unprecedented rights for women.

Although Mozambique has made economic progress in recent years, much of the country's population continues to struggle with poverty, hunger, and illiteracy, especially in isolated rural areas. A 2002 study of the roots of childhood malnutrition found that unhealthy feeding practices and illnesses caused by poor sanitation are key contributors to the problem. Taboos and ignorance often lead to deficiencies in children's diets, even when healthy foods are available. For example, mothers normally feed plain porridge to young children, ignoring vitamin- or protein-rich foods such as nuts and greens that are produced locally.

The sale of 100 metric tons of corn to the World Food Program stands as a major success for the 15 small-scale farmers who belong to Associacão Kugarike Tangue Nhamo, an association of small-scale farmers in Mavonde in central Mozambique's Manica Province.

Agriculture extension services play an important role in Mozambique, where four of five people live in rural areas and most survive by subsistence farming. USAID-funded food security programs, which are run by private voluntary organizations like CARE, rely heavily on locally hired extension agents, who work with groups of small-scale farmers to help them grow more food and increase their incomes. USAID also is working to strengthen the government's capacity to deliver quality extension services.

USAID partner Africare selected businesswoman Rita Lazaro to lead a pilot rural enterprise project making soy milk and other high-nutrition products with a VitaGoat food-processing system. Lazaro is a successful oil processor in Munhinga in central Mozambique's Manica Province, where she employs three workers to help press sesame and sunflower oil. The mother of two is also a leader in Africare's USAID-funded food security program in Manica. Lazaro works with more than 150 families in the program, teaching them improved agriculture and nutrition practices.

In Southern Africa, inorganic fertilizers are often too costly for the rural poor. Without access to fertilizers, farmers struggle to grow food for a growing population. At the same time, a host of related issues such as deforestation, land degradation, soil erosion, local climate change, and loss of biodiversity all hasten the decline of soil fertility.

Six thousand students in Mozambique's isolated northern provinces of Cabo Delgado and Niassa -two of the poorest regions in one of Africa's poorest countries- have gone back to school. But these students aren't children- they are teachers, school librarians, and administrators.

Throughout the outlying area of Beira City in central Mozambique, young people are transforming dank and dirty schools into healthy, inviting places of learning. Children as young as seven are the messengers, educating their peers, their families and their communities about the importance of safe water, good hygiene and private, separate sanitation facilities.

Throughout the outlying area of Beira City in central Mozambique, young people are transforming dank and dirty schools into healthy, inviting places of learning. Children as young as seven are the messengers, educating their peers, their families and their communities about the importance of safe water, good hygiene and private, separate sanitation facilities.

It was a race against time. If Delphina, 18, did not plant any seeds by mid- April, there would be no vital harvest this year, aggravating an already desperate situation in central Mozambique.