News

LEAVE or LIVE

"In these uncertain times, you have two choices, LEAVE or LIVE." 

Powerwoman 3: Ruth Banda

Agriterra trained 14 strong willed female (future) leaders in the first ever ‘Female Leadership in Agricultural Cooperatives Masterclass’, held in Kenya. The group is composed of Zambian, Ugandese and Kenyan participants, representing organisations that are active in coffee, dairy, sunflower or credit and saving.

Main purpose of the masterclass is to strengthen the leadership skills of these women. These highly motivated cooperative leaders return full of energy and ambitions back to their respective cooperatives, better equipped to take up their leadership roles and make a change contributing to closing the gender gap in agricultural cooperatives.

Powerwoman 3: Ruth Banda (64) from Chadiza District Farmers Association  (CDFA) in Zambia 

Food security in the Philippines during the lockdown and the role of cooperatives

The capital of the Philippines and surrounding cities and municipalities, as well as some provinces have been under lock down for more than a month now. There has been a disruption in the supply of food to the cities due to different interpretations and implementation of the national directives by local governments - restrictions in activities, checkpoints for trucks and cargoes, etc.
Food and essential products and activities are supposedly exempted from the restrictions, but this did not happen as intended by the government. In response, the government reiterated such exemptions and tried to facilitate the flow of food supply through food pass, do not delay signs, special permits, etc. There are also different initiatives from all sectors to make food supply available - buying produce directly from farmers for food relief and mobile markets, online ordering and delivery of food products, etc.

Member commitment in times of COVID-19

'We are not in normal times'. You might have heard this statement quite often these past few weeks. Well, in these abnormal times you make lemonade with the lemons life has given. In Twi (my local parlance), there is a proverb that "biribi es3e a na ne yie mua", literally meaning "in every misfortune lies an opportunity".

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step

The Thang Binh cooperative was set up in 2013 from a cooperative group of sugarcane farmers in Dak Lak province of Central Highland Vietnam. Most of the members are immigrants from Quang Nam – a Central coastal province - to Central Highland in the wave of New Economic Zones in 1980s. They named this cooperative Thang Binh as a way to remind of their homeland (Thang Binh district). Thang Binh has started working with Agriterra since 2018.

Powerwoman 2: Sarah Bagampangire

Agriterra trained 14 strong willed female (future) leaders in the first ever ‘Female Leadership in Agricultural Cooperatives Masterclass’, held in Kenya. The group is composed of Zambian, Ugandese and Kenyan participants, representing organisations that are active in coffee, dairy, sunflower or credit and saving.

Main purpose of the masterclass is to strengthen the leadership skills of these women. These highly motivated cooperative leaders return full of energy and ambitions back to their respective cooperatives, better equipped to take up their leadership roles and make a change contributing to closing the gender gap in agricultural cooperatives.

Powerwoman 2: Sarah Bagampangire from Kasaali Farmers’ Cooperative Society in Uganda 

Supporting the cooperative via online training

In February 2020 the final phase of the study Food & Business (HAN) started for Laura Polo with an internship for Agriterra. She would work on an assignment for 21 weeks, focussing on coffee cooperatives in the Great Lake Region: Rwanda, Congo & Burundi. But it turned out differently.

Read her blog: 

GROW Coop and Agriterra facilitate Coop to Coop Trade as a COVID 19 emergency response

THE PHILIPPINES -The current emergency situation has placed the food production or distribution (agri-products) to a standstill. As a result of the community quarantines, local area lockdowns and the apprehension of people to travel, farmer producers in the provinces can not sell their products while consumers in key cities are having a hard time getting enough food supplies. Aside from the loss of income and the hardship this brings to households in the cities, this problem will escalate to a bigger scarcity of food should the farmers do not plant for the next season.