by Marilee Karl

"Women are the pillars of African society, both economically and culturally. In time of hardship and in crisis, women always devise some survival techniques and strategies.

"In the case of Matebeleland in Zimbabwe, the women, especially those in the Organization of Rural Associations for Progress (ORAP), devised very successful survival strategies. First they organized themselves into small groups which they called family units. These groups were composed of five to ten families. Through these groups they harvested the few resources they had. This included food and wood. Some cooked and fed their children jointly. They contributed small sums of money to pay educational expenses for children of very poor families.

"Women do not only have visible survival strategies. In stressful situations, they give each other strength and courage to go on.

Sithembiso Nyoni

We are very happy to welcome back to our pages Sithembiso Nyoni. Several years ago, she wrote an article for one of the early issues of the Isis International Bulletin on Women in Southern Africa. That was in 1978 while the war of liberation was still raging in Zimbabwe. At that time, she wrote how rural women, caught up in the midst of the conflict and suffering great hardship, were determined to fight against u. exploitation of women as well as to assist in the struggle to liberate their country. Zimbabwean women were working to "make sure that they share the cake of freedom...making plans and taking responsibility for their actions
towards their own solutions. The women are to be their own liberators along with the men."

In Zimbabwe, unlike in some countries, there was never a question of women going back to the kitchen after the liberation struggle was over. True, women in Zimbabwe, like their sisters elsewhere, are responsible for preparing and cooking food and feeding their families. But in Zimbabwe, as in most countries of Africa, women arc also the ones who grow and produce the food.

Since Zimbabwe achieved majority rule in 1979, women have been organizing themselves in groups and organizations, such as the Zimbabwe Women's Bureau, the Women's Action Group, the Women in Media Group, whose voices we have heard in the pages of the Isis International publications, and many others. They have also been active in many other groups and organizations, especially farmers associations like ORAP.

The country has gone through some difficult times the past few years and rural women have not had it easy. But even if there are no great shining victories to hold up, women have gone forward with many small achievements for themselves and their families, while contributing to the development of their country.

"They have done this in difficult circumstances, including the drought that has affected so many parts of the African continent for much of the 1980s.

The Image of Africa

Sithembiso Nyoni was in Rome for a meeting of African and European Non-Governmental Organizations on the Image of Africa in the Media in 1988. The meeting was part of a study of the striking images that were shown in the international media of the emergency food crisis situation in Africa, especially during the years 1984 to 1986. The underlying concern of the study was: did these images give a true picture of what was happening in Africa and why? Did they help or not?

We have seen these images and probably what comes most to mind is the picture of the starving mother and child. "This image of a 'Starving Africa which needs emergency relief aid' has no doubt helped to alleviate the suffering of those who were trapped in the end process of a food crisis. But it has also cost some of the local self-help and self-reliant efforts a lot of long-term financial support," writes Sithembiso Nyoni. This image also does not reflect the truth of the matter that in most parts of Africa it is women who have adapted and developed techniques and strategies to survive the drought and the food crisis.

Many farmers in Africa made preparations when they saw the drought coming, explained Sithembiso — especially the women. When the drought came, men went off to the cities to look for jobs which were mostly unavailable. Women and children stayed on the land. They switched to growing crops that needed less water; they rebuilt irrigation systems that had been destroyed in the war and found ways to conserve water; they used their knowledge of soils to plant early or late depending on what was best for the crop. They organized themselves into groups that could give both emergency solidarity and aid to each other and develop long- term plans.

In her report to the Image of Africa meeting, Sithembiso Nyoni writes: "As is true of most riu-al groups in Zimbabwe, the Tsholotsho communities have been meeting since independence to discuss the total situation of underdevelopment, poverty and hunger and try to find solutions to these problems. They have as a result formulated certain strategies which reveal their level of understanding of hunger as a symptom of powerlessness, poverty and underdevelopment and dependency on foreign aid, foreign food production methods and inputs. They have therefore adopted food production and survival practices, within their control in order to get rid of hunger, but also of underdevelopment and dependency...

"Rural women provide the vital instrument for solving the food crisis in Africa— Zimbabwe is not an exception. Because rural women perform most of the agricultural activities in addition to their domestic work, provisions should be made to upgrade the status of rural women."

"Rural women provide the vital instrument for solving the food crisis in Africa"