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Momodou
Denmark
11735 Posts |
 Posted - 18 Jan 2008 : 20:53:47
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Women Farmers In Kantora Look For A Better Price
By Lamin Fatty
The women farmers in Kantora, as in many other places in the country, have been selling their groundnuts across the border, in neighbouring Senegal, where it is said they are better paid. These farmers are complaining of being exploited at the seccos by the offer of low prices.
This reporter caught up with a group of women with bags and pans of shelled groundnuts on their way to the weekly ‘lumo’ of Manda, in neighbouring Senegal, who told him that they are tired of being exploited. They said that groundnut cultivation is the most difficult type of farming but that the reward does not commensurate with the hard labour that it entails.
Teneng Sanyang, a groundnut farmer, who lives at Sotuma Village in Kantora District, said they would rather take their groundnut produce to Manda, where they expect a better price than to take it to the seccos or repots for very low prices. She argued that if they take their nuts to Manda, a good price will be paid instantly and which will enable them to buy more items for their families and to better prepare themselves for the next farming season.
Another groundnut producer, Balang Sanyang, argued that whenever they sell their groundnuts at a buying point (secco), they are open to exploitation because they cannot read the scale used to weigh their crop; that since they cannot read the scale they can be cheated and paid anything. She argued that on the other hand, if they decorticate their groundnuts and sell in cups then it becomes easy to know how much is sold; that they cannot be cheated this way.
Tai Sanyang, Mafenda and Kai, all groundnut farmers, echoed similar statements and saying that the era of exploiting them has gone, especially when the groundnut crop is the most marketable produce so far.
Source: Foroyaa Newspaper Burning Issues
Issue No. 007/2008, 17 January 2008
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