Aladinma Umukabia Ogodo Multi-purpose cooperative society is an association of over 200 women cassava farmers operating in Imo State. These women come together to help each other pursue economic prosperity for a simple reason: to take better care of their children. Veronica Njoku is the Vice President of the Association.
Farming, she says, is the most common job available to them in the village. ‘’But the way we have been planting is not yielding anything’’ She admits. ‘’So now, when PIND came, we felt that it would help us to know more in agriculture. ’’
Veronica and the members of her association learned two important things that would improve their yield after participating in PIND’s the cassava demonstration plot intervention.
‘’One, how to make ridges. Before we just plant ordinarily and when we don’t use ridges, the soil is hard and does not allow the cassava grow very well. Second, when PIND came in 2016, they brought Umudike, Umuahia agricultural people (National Root Crops Research Institute) and gave us improved varieties. We now planted it last year and saw that it was wonderful. Then I decided to do it on my own’’. The women also learned about using fertilizers.
Super excited by the new knowledge, she did not hesitate to begin applying them in the 2017 planting season.
‘’Being an officer and executive member of the society, I have to showcase what I have learned from what I am being taught. You see these ridges now’’ she says, pointing to her cassava farm ‘’nothing will stop my cassava from growing and growing. I have planted improved varieties. After growing, the fertilizer will now make the cassava to be fat’’.
Veronica was quick to notice the difference in her farm following the new practices she adopted. ‘’I made two rows of 25 ridges each (total of 50 ridges). After applying fertilizer, in one ridge, I get a bag of cassava, one full bag, because it now yields very well!’’. This means she gets 50 full bags of cassava.
This change in yield improved her economic contribution, just as the association desires for its members. ‘’What I used to get before is just to make my family feed. But now, after farming, I can harvest it and sell and train my children (in school) and still feed well. The improved stems…I can even sell them to make money from people who are looking for it’’ Veronica acclaims.
The association has a key challenge regarding lands. ‘’We cannot acquire as many land as we need because here, it is the duty of our husbands to measure it to us, bamboo to bamboo’’. She hopes that seeing how much yield she is now making from her farm would compel her husband to give her more land to expand her business.
For Veronica, PIND’s coming benefitted the association as an organization. ‘’PIND trained us’’ she acknowledges ‘’they built our association’s management skills with training. Members of our association got exposure from that and we have also began to produce honey from beekeeping’’.
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