MAY 2003

The Hunger Project-Benin Expands Reach Dramatically

Since October 2002, The Hunger Project-Benin has expanded to two more epicenters, bringing the total to eight, which includes some 700,000 people.

The epicenters are a hub for a variety of activities including: literacy classes for adults along with pre-school classes; the purchase of milling machines to reduce women's drudgery by hours each day; ovens for bread-baking result in increased incomes for many women; and communal gardens are yielding rice harvests.

The African Woman Food Farmer Initiative (AWFFI) empowers women at all epicenters with Vision, Commitment and Action Workshops (VCAW) and a variety of training programs for income-generating projects.

 

AWFFI women who have completed a Vision, Commitment and Action Workshop at the Dassa-Zoume Epicenter. 

A woman demonstrating her ability to write in her language. 

Rice is being cultivated on community land which surrounds the Wawata Epicenter. 

Poultry farming has become a great income-generating project for women. Hunger Project Country Director Pascal Djohossou admires the facility. 

Women and men become literate at the Kpinnou Epicenter literacy program.

Freshly baked loaves of bread ready to sell. 

This machine reduces women's work by hours each day since they no longer need to pound the grain by hand. 

The establishment of food banks at each epicenter ensures that no one will go hungry during the "lean times" between harvests. 

Vegetables are not customarily eaten. Learning about nutrition is a part of the training THP provides. Here women are washing cabbage before cooking it.

Country Director Djohossou meets with the local committee that is planning the construction of a new epicenter, Avlame.