If the Z.B.A. is to come up with a strategy that helps improve the livelihoods of women headed households, there will be a need for processes to be put in place to enhance some of the livelihood strategies that poor women have resorted to in Ndola. The Z.B.A. could come up with ways that would help women to become agents of their own development rather than providing charity for them.
In 5.4. we identified a range of existing strategies that women have adopted in Ndola. It is clear that the Z.B.A. needs to enhance some of these whilst discouraging others, due to their unsustainability as well as the way they undermine women's dignity and household well being. It is important to note that the Z.B.A. can not encourage some of the survival strategies some women have adopted in Ndola like begging (5.4.3.), illicit beer brewing (5.4.6.) and prostitution. These are contrary to their doctrinal beliefs and values as a Church organization.
Now we shall examine ways the Z.B.A. could come up with strategies to enhance some of the other livelihood strategies of women headed households.
6.3.1. Selling food and groceries in shacks
The Z.B.A could work towards the removal of constraints associated with selling food.
They could make use of their Church buildings and the availability of man and woman power within the Z.B.A to help poor women with skills on running a business effectively.
This would help women gain understanding about business ethics and the logistics of simple bookkeeping, profit making, investing and saving.
The Z.B.A could also lobby the municipality to consider ways they could build shop stands for poor women who at most times sell their merchandise in unhealthy environments. Instead of the municipality chasing these women from the shacks and the roadside where they sell food and groceries, they would be helped to have a market place, which could be kept clean and secured from catching fire.
6.3.2. Subsistence farming
Since subsistence farming is one of the major livelihood strategies for many poor women in Zambia, 1 feel the Z.B.A. needs to come up with concrete strategies that would help to enhance this livelihood strategy. I have pointed out already some of the ways the Z.B.A.
could help poor women who are involved in subsistence farming, 6.1.3.1., (helping women to access land) and 6.1.3.3., (organic farming). I feel the Z.B.A. will need to work at enhancing subsistence farming in some of the ways presented below.
6.3.2.1. Crop diversification
Other than accessing land and providing organic farming techniques for poor women, the Z.B.A. could also help to provide basic training in farming for poor women in Ndola.
They could introduce training on crop rotation and crop diversification. In Malawi, the United Nations Development Programme used the SLF to intervene in a poor farming community that had been affected with drought.170 They worked with the local people there to plant drought resistant crops like sorghum. This helped to alleviate poverty in that particular community because sorghum and some of the drought resistant crops do
170
UNDP. "Sustainable Livelihoods: Overview", p.4.
not need much water or fertilizers. Many poor women plant maize as their staple crop and usually maize does not yield much in times of drought. I would thus propose to the Z.B.A. that they help poor women who are so dependant on maize that needs much rain and fertilizer, to diversify the crops they are planting. Drought resistant crops need to be promoted among poor women subsistence farmers.
6.3.2.2. Improvement of communication networks in Ndola rural
Many poor women who are involved in subsistence farming as their livelihood strategy, live in the rural parts of Ndola. In these areas roads are impassable and there is no good transport system or telephones. The issue of improving the communication system in the Ndola rural areas has been key on the agenda of most politicians who stand for election for positions as members of parliament. They ask people to vote for them and promise that once they get into parliament, they will ensure that they improve roads and provide telephone facilities for the local people. Once these politicians are voted into power, they forget to fulfil their promises and are not seen in the area until the next election. The Z.B.A. could follow up on these many promises that have been made by parliamentary candidates and challenge them to fulfil their promises. The Z.B.A. could challenge members of parliament to work on improving roads and telephone facilities in the farming areas of Ndola. When this is done, it would help to have farmers take their surplus produce to the market.
6.3.3. Charcoal Burning
In 6.1.3.2.1 pointed out that the Z.B.A. needs to have an initiative of helping poor women who have charcoal burning as their livelihood strategy to plant new trees as they cut down old ones. As pointed out earlier, many people in Ndola use charcoal for cooking, lighting and heating in the cold season. There are also many electricity failures in Ndola, especially in the rain season. This makes charcoal a very important commodity in Ndola
and many poor people living in townships have taken up charcoal burning as a livelihood strategy. It is clear that it is impossible to stop charcoal burning in the near future, so the planting of trees becomes a key task to secure this livelihood strategy. At the same time, the Z.B.A. could promote the use of energy efficient stoves so that households use less charcoal. Such stoves are promoted by various agencies like Care International, with whom the Z.B.A. could enter into partnerships.