The agonising voice of a thirty-nine-year-old poor village woman went unheard after the sudden death of her husband.
Finding no other alternative to survive, Nasima Akhtar struggled to earn her livelihood at a grassroots level by becoming a woman farmer. She had to start her day before sunrise and used to continue after sunset to overcome the perilous path.
The misery beset the family after the tragic death of Ramzan, husband of Nasima, in a fatal road accident that pushed the entire family into total disarray. The tragedy sounded like a bolt from the blue to Nasima as she became helpless after the death of her husband. She used to live in the Haluaghat village of Raipura upazila in the Narsingdi district. Her husband died a few years ago in a road accident.
Her husband ran his six-member family with a meagre income from his job.
After the death of her husband, Nasima had to face serious hardships in maintaining her family as she was the only bread earner of the family. Even she was forced to stop the education of her three children due to poverty.
Nasima started nourishing to become self-reliant through farming, and accordingly, she broached the idea of cultivating sweet potato. The idea clicked and changed her fate.
Nasima said, "I cultivated sweet potato on 150 decimals of land. I planted saplings of local sweet potato five years ago.''
After getting good returns, she planted saplings of different varieties of vegetables along with sweet potato in 2017.
Following the footstep of Nasima, thousands of extremely poor people living in 12 remote char unions of Sadar and Raipura upazilas of the district have successfully defeated poverty by adopting various income-generating activities.
Rowsan, another woman of the area, said that she had cultivated potato on 100 decimals of land after getting inspired by Nasima. And now, she is earning Taka five to six lakh every year through the cultivation of various vegetables.
Local people said most of the people here have achieved success through farming groundnut, sweet potato and various vegetables on vast tracts of sandy barren char land in Meghna and Arial Khan river basins.
Besides, a number of poor people living in the char villages of the district have also achieved self-reliance through the rearing of livestock on char land, fish farming and duck rearing in the rivers, they said.
The local Agricultural Extension Department provided training to the farmers of char villages on groundnut, sweet potato and various vegetable cultivation. The DAE also provided them with seeds and pesticides free of cost. Currently, the people of char villages of the district are leading a completely changed life with achieving hygienic sanitation and access to pure drinking water, reduction of malnutrition of their children, women and pregnant women.
Their children are now going to school regularly.
Deputy Director of the DAE Lotafat Hossain told BSS that farmers of the locality could bring about revolutionary changes in their lives after getting training as well as assistance from them.
It needs a concerted effort to create a conducive atmosphere to bring women into farming for empowering them at a grassroots level by providing them knowledge on the technical and financial aspects. The empowerment of women will face a dearth without empowering those who are living in rural areas.
