We were fortunate to have the help of Amour Mohammed, who is a farmer and private pesticide retailer on Pemba, who let us interview him and gave us two mornings of his time and energy to bring us to the farming communities of Weni and Mangwena. We were so surprised to see that instead of having individual farms, most of the farms in the area were huge plots of land owned by the government and leased back to the people in 0.1-Hectare plots. Most of the farms were rice paddies, a few grew tomatoes and cassava. The farms were breathtaking.
We had made a 26-question survey for the farmers to take. We were expecting to only get 10-15 surveys filled during our time, but were fortunate enough to get 47. The farmers were so excited to take the survey, even though probably a third of them were illiterate. The ones that couldn't read or write were helped by their colleagues (or me or Lauren, which was pretty laughable). Still in the process of analyzing the data and putting the finishing touches on our paper, but it is definitely clear that some pesticide education and training needs to be made available to the farmers. About 50% reported wearing no protective clothing or gear during pesticide application, and about 40% reported feeling symptoms of acute pesticide poisoning post-application. Can't wait to get back there to get to work!
We stayed in a wonderful little guesthouse in the heart of Wete which became our home. At the guesthouse, there was a cute couple (who we think owned the place), Doctor Omar (who went to Harvard and speaks wonderful English) and his wife Nuru/Mama. They honestly became like a second family in the week we were there - we got cooking lessons from Mama, life advice from Dakatari, and lots of pleasant company. We had so much fun practicing our cooking skills and sharing "chakula marekani" with our friends in Wete. We were sad to leave but we are now off to Dar es Salaam which will be yet another adventure!
Time to write and study. Baadaye!
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