Angola: Sustainable Livelihoods and Environment

Southern Angola has been suffering from recurrent droughts and other climate-related disasters, with increasing severity since 2012. The specific geography and climate of the four provinces most affected by droughts in recent years - Namibe, Cunene, Huila and Bié - increase their vulnerability to climate change and climate-related disasters. The Namibe province is very particular in that it is the only coastal province, but also the driest of the drought-affected provinces. It is almost exclusively a desert and arid zone, with extremely limited rainfall, making pastoral and agricultural communities dependent on groundwater sources and seasonal rivers, used for irrigation, livestock, and human consumption. This makes the population of the Namibe Province highly vulnerable to any natural or human-induced changes in the local ecosystem, including issues of land rights and access, overgrazing, overfarming or climate change.
Limited access to water severely limits food production. Therefore, the affected families are dependent on emergency food supplies provided by the government. As a result of the lack of water and food availability, hygiene conditions and practices deteriorate and, together with the lack of food diversity, are leading to high levels of malnutrition in the province.
The action is implemented jointly by PIN and ASD - Action for Solidarity and Development (Acção de Solidariedade e Desenvolvimento) and aims to improve the resilience and nutritional status of drought prone agricultural and pastoralist communities prone to drought in the municipalities of Moçâmedes and Camacuio. In order to respond to the main problems described above the proposed action aims to achieve the following: increase the capacity and use of drinking water sources and improve access to drinking water for human consumption and food processing, increase the capacity of water sources and improve access to water for irrigation and livestock, establish clear management and technical institutional systems for existing and newly established water sources used for both agriculture and human consumption, and finally improve skills, capacity and awareness of good hygiene and nutrition practices among local community members and of the local community and nutrition stakeholders to prevent and respond to cases of malnutrition.
However, access to water is affecting men and women differently. In the target communities, women and girls are responsible for collecting water for their households. Due to the drought, the time and distances to collect water are even more difficult. Most of the men are herders and are migrating with their cattle to other provinces less affected by the drought, leaving women with limited resources and dependent on emergency food supplies.
According to the EU National Gender Profile for Angola, women are also not sufficiently empowered to participate in community decision-making processes. To mitigate this problem, the proposed action conducts the community participatory process in the design of Natural Resource Management Plans, during which input from men and women is collected separately. PIN and its Angolan partner ASD encourage women to participate in all Cash for Work (CfW) activities, to provide temporary work and income during the herder migration season. Since women are more likely to spend their income on food and health expenses for their children, this contribute significantly to improving the nutritional outcomes of the target communities. In order to promote the participation of women with young children, CfW sites will provide facilities for child care and will include awareness raising on nutrition and hygiene.
Overall, at least 15,260 people will benefit from improved access to water in the target areas, including pastoralists, farmers and at least 13,080 people will benefit from improved knowledge about nutrition and hygiene practices including households with children under 5, pregnant and lactating women, health system employees and members of local authorities.
 

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected the global economy and economic crisis in Angola. The restrictions imposed by the state of emergency affected both families and private companies, and particularly women who represent the majority in the informal labor market. Project Women Entrepreneurs contributes to mitigate the socio-economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic by expanding knowledge, understanding of the formal sector, improving business management skills and strengthening the protection of vulnerable women and girls in Angola. The 6 months intervention is in line with the priorities of the MEP-UNDP Project for the Promotion of an Inclusive Transition from the Informal Economy to the Formal Economy as it aims to support the transition of women with informal employment to the formal economy and improve their access to financial, social and business development services.
Beneficiaries of this initiatives are mainly local women. Thus, at least 50 women´s group supported as part of the business development program, at least 10 women´s groups supported with a grant and a consultancy service to develop or build their business and at least 1000 women with informal employment targeted by the awareness campaign. In addition, there will be provided training of advocacy groups and community agents, awareness campaign and community workshops.
 

How to improve agricultural production and nutrition of families? Farming practices still used in Jamba and Chicomba municipalities of Huíla province undermine the resilience of agriculture production, since they rely heavily on unsustainable land use. Farmers often do achieve sufficient production, but with low diversity, and without acquiring the full nutritional and financial potential. There’s a need to improve awareness about good nutrition practices, including early nutrition practices, water and hygiene practices, cooking practices, and awareness of dietary diversity.
The project Chitanda (a word in Umbundu language meaning ‘market’ or ‘market product’), implemented in partnership with the local NGO ASD (Solidarity and Development Action), addresses these key challenges through a number of integrated actions.
We organise trainings to technicians from governmental institutions in order to strengthen their knowledge and share approaches to innovations in agricultural techniques. In order to increase the production capacities of small-scale farmers, we support Farmer Field Schools designed to improve their knowledge and skills on innovative good agriculture practices and climate-smart farming methods, including trainings on topics like land preparation, soil fertility, sowing and planting, harvest. In addition to theoretical and practical trainings, we distribute kits to the farmers composed of tools, seeds and plantation materials, fertilizers and other equipment, such as wheelbarrows, shovels, strings, fencing or seedlings. Demonstration plots are selected among vulnerable farmers to present climate-smart agriculture techniques, including agroforestry, intercropping, conservation agriculture and gravity irrigation. As a way to share experiences, Farmer Field Days are organised in the beginning of the season and after the harvest.
Small and medium enterprises, self-help groups and community-based organisations are also a part of the project. We introduce improved agriculture processing technologies among those, allowing smallholders to transform their production locally and sell at a higher price. At the same time, we support self-help groups and community-based organisations in developing small businesses around these processing technologies. Exposure visits for small producers and cooperatives are also held in order to improve cooperation in sales.
With regard to nutrition, we organise workshops for nutrition specialists and voluntary health workers on topics like causes of malnutrition, transmission paths of diarrheal disease, and good infant and young child feeding. Community Health Days are organised to raise awareness on good nutrition practices among the local population.
Throughout a period of 30 months, the project intends to aid more than 540 small-scale farmers and horticulturalists, 40 health system staff, 24 government staff from the agriculture offices, 15 small and medium enterprises, 80 market actors and 900 women that are pregnant or with children under the age of five.
 

People in Need works to improve long-term food and nutrition security in Angola, through a project that integrates both agricultural and nutrition sectors. The agricultural component aims at increasing and diversifying crop production and raising small farmer’s income.
PIN provides beneficiaries with practical trainings and continuous advisory support, as well as relevant agriculture inputs. The supply of seeds of highly nutritive crops like soybean, groundnut, sweet potato and fruit trees is part of the project, that also fosters the implementation of vegetable-gardens and new irrigation systems, and the production of organic fertilizer. The initiative also promotes better practices for duck breeding and distributes cattle in Bié province, where the presence of bovine is very small.
As a result of the rise in the agricultural production, the workforce demand in the selected villages should also increase. PIN also encourages cooperative work of women and gives support in terms of income generation activities.
The nutrition component focuses on improving the dietary patterns of children and young women through training courses and campaigns on how to cook nutrient-rich food, the importance of breastfeeding, and safe hygiene practices. The nutrition work is expected to enhance the access to nutrient rich food in the target areas. In total, 3,000 households benefit from the project.

800 farmers successfully passed the courses and expanded and enriched  their own production thanks to the provision of small grants. During the training, they learned  basic agricultural techniques such as crop rotation, fertilization, pest prevention and cultivation of new crops. They also learned how to take care of poultry and livestock and prevent animal diseases. Thanks to the training, their own crops increased two to three-fold. Their families and communities now have access to a nutritionally enriched diet, including protein, and have increased the income and the health status of their whole family.

Similarly, within their communities in the rural farm schools, a thousand farmers are taught by PIN trainers and extention workers. The Farmers Field Schools offer illiterate or little educated residents simple techniques and visual practical learning on training plots, where several approaches can be tried and evaluated. They also learn to take care of goats, chickens or bees, and test their own skills thanks to loans that are provided in the form of seeds, tools and livestock. In the future, the most successful Farmers Field School can obtain a larger  community grant, such as a plow or water power plant

Additionally, women learn how to grow medicinal herbs, which are often the only available medication for the rural communities.

The Agrarian center, sample farm set by PIN, offers the residents of Cuemba a number of services including a small mill, a shop with agrarian  inputs, a tractor rental and other machinery, etc. The Agrarian center also buys produce from farmers in addition to selling its own.Moreover, the center runs a bakery and provides around 4000 loaves of bread on a daily basis to the residents of the town.

We also support the organization of  village markets, linking urban merchants and rural farmers. Farmers buy agricultural inputs such as tools, boots, fertilisers or seeds, and  merchants buy their produce and sell it back in the towns.