CAIRO: You just can t be a successful farmer these days in Egypt without having business skills, a fax machine, and a computer. El Shams project, which has introduced all that along with extensive agricultural training, hosted last week in Cairo an exhibition to introduce 105 farmer associations to exporters and high-end local buyers. The Enhanced Livelihoods from Smallholder Horticultural Activities Managed Sustainability (El Shams) project, begun under Care Egypt in 2003, is devoted to providing technical assistance and training to growers and agricultural workers in Upper Egypt, especially to women, who are increasingly becoming the sole heads of households. The goal is to improve the quality, communication, and marketing of the products to make them suitable for high-value export or domestic markets. The result is visibly improved production quality and standards of living for the communities involved. Thomas Herlehy, Chief of Party of El Shams project, encourages farmers to think of farming as a business. He says the main achievement of the project is the change of mentality among the farmers that we are working with. Instead of growing something because their father and their grandfathers and great grandfathers used to, we tell them, don't put a seed in the ground before you know who is going to buy what you grow. This may include introducing new crops, which took place in Assuit, where medicinal plants, strawberries, and green beans were cultivated for the first time for export. It also involves increased direct communication between farmers and buyers. In 2003 about 650 farmers cultivated 760 feddans with high-value crops, yielding LE 4.5 million at the farm gate retail outlets. Three years later the numbers have risen dramatically, with 6,500 farmers cultivating 9,300 feddans at a farm gate value of LE 47.8, according to Care Egypt's report. These numbers translate into improved incomes, stability and standard of living for the farmers, who often spend the income earned on education and health services. One woman said she was spending her income on a computer course. The training and the experience I gained has made me realize the value of time and precision, said Ola Othman Nasr, mother of four from Fayoum. I never thought of the value of time, but now I know that I could work, and at same time that I could save. Intisar Abou Deif, Chairwoman of a Sohag Community Development Association (CDA) and mother of three said In the past the rural woman didn t get out of her home; child-bearing was our only concern. After the training that we received, we trained other women on food production which helps provide them with a monthly income. Her CDA has employed 14 very poor woman-headed households after they received training on how to produce pickles, jam and clothes. Some women have even been sent to trainings in Lebanon, Cairo and Alexandria. "Care has done a lot in our village and at the level of the rural communities. Nowadays every CDA has a fax machine and a computer which we use to get information about the prices of crops which I pass on to the rest of farmers, said farmer Ahmed Abdel Nasser from Assuit. Farmers are trained on how to computerize records and establish emails to communicate directly with buyers and with information sources. Abdel Nasser also added that the benefit was not only for farmers and exporters. He said: "Export crops provide more job opportunities that were not there before such as the packaging, drivers [from Assuit to Cairo] and collection centers. CDAs also increase guarantees and predictability for buyers, which in turn affects sellers. Talaat Abdel Shakour, owner of Al Nada Export Company says that The quality is better. Before dealing with the CDAs we used to suffer from a lot of crop diseases. Now we guarantee higher quality control. Eventually farmers will be able to export to the European Union. But first they must attain a Euro Gap certificate, which guarantees environmentally safe agricultural and pesticide practices, as well as proper worker conditions. Care is currently undertaking training for CDAs to acquire the certificate. More than 11,000 members in over 100 Farmers Associations (FA) have been established in 80 communities across cities like Fayoum, Sohag, Qena, Assuit, Giza, and Luxor. El Shams works with partners University of California Davis, ACDI/VOCA, Nile Valley Group, and Environmental Quality International, with the USAID-awarded grant. -With additional reporting from Amira El Messeiry
