article this is a little article I wrote for the newsletter of the "Agronomy and Forestry without borders."
an article for a newsletter of agronomists have asked me ... when I was not very convinced.
points down
First: I'm not an agronomist.
Second, they are not use to write "on command" (maybe that's why I set aside the dream of being a journalist after realizing autonomy before deciding what to write you have to do 20 years of playing).
points for
First: I A member of agronomists and forest without borders.
Secondly, I am project leader of an agricultural project in Zambia.
Third, I always like to talk in Zambia and what I do. A
Favare beats down 3-2.
And here we are then.
I arrived in Zambia in November 2006, after having followed a path quite common to many young Italians: Bachelor, Master, Stage, unemployment, despair, light at the end of the tunnel. The light at the end of the tunnel is a pleasant village named Gwembe in the southern provinces of that country called Zambia. Do not pretend to know him. Do not know where it is (for assonance, close to Zanzibar Zimbabwe ... but not, alas!) Nor when is the last time you've heard. Zambia is famous for three things: Victoria Falls, for being the birthplace of Milingo and Wilbur Smith and have beaten Italy 4-0 in a game of the 1988 Olympics ... well, not really a CV to scream.
I had the good fortune to know, during my master's in Peru, Master organized by the Faculty of Agriculture, University of Padua, one of my classmate, Victor, who had been there. It is also a lecturer of the course, Mariella, we had passed some years before. Stop.
In the 27 years of life prior to my arrival at the Lusaka in November 2006 these were the only information I knew about a country twice the size of Italy, which is located somewhere in the region known as Southern Africa.
And now I'm here for almost 4 years. "How do you stay there for so long?" Every time someone asks me. But why in Zambia? Effective in vivo in a town of 30,000 inhabitants, Mazabuka, where the two attractions are the supermarket and one of the largest sugar cane plantations in Africa ...
(And I'm "improving." The first two and a half years were spent in a village / mission of Jesus of 500 inhabitants, Chikuni. In comparison, I now seem to be the Glock that can be washed at home without going down in the courtyard!).
The
Zambia just like me, I like my job, I like the organization I work for (CeLIM, NGOs, Milan) which sometimes growl, but that rumbling turned to his friend who occasionally does some "crap" (I guess you could say, we are talking about agriculture), but that's always good to want.
CeLIM are the third project in Zambia. The first two and a half years I spent in a microcredit project in the valley of Gwembe. The valley is cut off from Africa, globalization, economics, communications. There was no network for mobile phones, almost total absence of cars (if we see one we stopped to avoid the precipice and to greet those who were to steering wheel), village children who had never seen nor white, nor a car. I never knew if they cried when they went down for me or watching the jeeppone 4x4 that I carried around ...
After two and a half years to be the only "Muzungu" (white) within a few tens of kilometers, the CeLIM asked me if I was willing to conclude a food security project and to move in the little charming town of Monze, which is some thirty miles to Gwembe / Chikuni. A
Monze Zambia I met a more rural, battered by the scourge of AIDS. The project will relieve "food packages" (animals - goats, chickens, pigs - as well as cash) for families with AIDS among its members. The attempt was to develop the IGA (income generating activities) to help the household economy and consequently their health.
And now I'm here in Mazabuka, caring for a project co-funded by the European Union. For those who love the technical terms, a project of Food Facility. For those who want to know what behind-the-book definition is: an agricultural project that seeks to promote a 'more related to agriculture and less marked on the existence, components of micro-credit, Conservation Farming, storage and preservation of crops.
After almost four years, I still divide between my office and survey field. And if it is true that the country of Zambia is not the Arcadia, every time I get in the car and I know that I expect a day of visits to project beneficiaries, trails in the middle of nowhere, blazing sun, dust or mud, zig zag among the flocks of goats and herds of cows ... well ... I can simply say that I'm just happy?