Women's group greenhouse

The Brazilian government has some programs and laws that promote local, small-scale agriculture.  One of the most interesting is a law that requires at least 30% of the food for school-feeding programs to be bought from local producers.

For small-scale producers, this provides a market for their goods and can also act as an incentive for farmers to diversify from export-oriented agriculture to include local, consumption-based products.

One of the women's groups that REDE works with was doing just that. Although they all work in their families' coffee plantations, they saw this program as another revenue stream for their families.

A community member set aside a piece of land on her property to be used as the women's group's garden.

They meet once a week for workdays, and all members are required to attend. Because many of the women also have small children, they designate one member of the group each week to be responsible for taking care of the children. Another member of the group is responsible to make lunch.

Every day of the week, a different member of the group is responsible for making sure the plants get watered.

They started selling vegetables to the local school. Then other members of the community heard about the women's vegetable production and asked how they could get their hands on the veggies. So the women started selling to other people in the community.

On the day that I visited them, REDE was helping them build a greenhouse to protect their seedlings during the rainy season. The women prepared a few more beds for the garden as their husbands worked together to build the greenhouse (can't escape those gender roles).

The workday had the same atmosphere as your standard minga in Ecuador.

Everyone shows up a little late, shmoozes for a while, and then drinks some coffee. Then someone questions the rational behind the whole endeavor, proposing they should change the entire plan, before being convinced that everything will be fine with the original one. Then they notice there is a tool missing that they think they need, but then realize they can do without.

Once at the worksite, there was a lot of standing around. All the men did their best civil engineer impression when trying to measure the dimensions for the proposed project. A few people took the lead in the project as the rest of them looked on. Little by little they all joined in the fun, dividing themselves among the necessary tasks. Before you know it, lunchtime arrives.

After lunch, the group takes some time to reassemble. There are typically fewer people working in the afternoon. Extended breaks always bring a few casualties to group projects. At this point, everyone just wants to finish the project and go home. So they get really motivated and pull it together.

On a funny note, I didn't really know what we were building until I saw all the materials. I had asked the technician from REDE what we were going to be building, and she said "estufa." I thought I knew what this word meant in Portuguese. When I saw the materials we were going to use, it was clear that I had no idea what "estufa" was, but it was too late to ask the technician again.

Now I know: estufa = greenhouse.