Food Security and Participative Communication

Results achieved as of the end of the project (November 2012) include: (i) producing vegetable gardens over eight hectares installing two new grain storage facilities and holding workshops on vegetable production and nutrition; (ii) reducing the amount of time that women spend carrying water for garden activities by installing 32 water wells; (iii) improving access to drinking water for human and animal consumption by installing five water wells in Simidji Zambougou Dienfeng Marako and Djongalan; (iv) reducing women’s workload by installing two grain mills in Massako and Zambougou; (v) planting over 0 25 hectares of Moringa oleifera trees which contributed to increasing the local population’s nutritional status; (vi) training 24 men and 26 women to train others in the production of Moringa oleifera trees; (vii) planting 11 000 Moringa oleifera trees in 11 village tree clusters and maintaining them; (viii) reducing women’s wood cutting activities as a result of the income generated by the sale of Moringa powder and garden vegetables; (ix) improving women’s leadership roles at community level in the 11 villages as a result of their participation in project management committees and the know-how they have acquired about Moringa garden production hygiene and well sanitation; and (x) reaching more than 75 000 people in the Quebec region of the Mauricie and from elsewhere in Canada (including 500 schools member of the In-Terre-Actif Network in all of the Francophonie) through a variety of activities that communicated project results. These results contributed to improving the food security or access to safe sufficient and nutritious food and health of the people living in the 11 villages and reducing women’s workloads and increasing their status as leaders in the community.