Kabu women small holder farmers find solace in new mill

By Kitab Unango

Women in Kabu village of Luri Payam who have had to travel miles to access grinding mill for the locally produced grains, have finally turned such movements into a past experience.

The village, situated along the Juba-Mundri road about 14 miles west of Juba, has no grinding mill and has a rare and very expensive means to reach the nearby market, Gudele..

Motorbike (boda-bida), the only available transportation means in the area, costs between SSP 1000 and SSP 1300, compelling the majority of peasant women to tread across miles to access grinding mill at least twice a week to put food on the table for their families.

However, with thee relative following the implementation of the peace agreeement, Kabu women formed five groups of 30 member each to find solutions to some of their challenges in the area.

The groups,  mainly the small holder farmers, have now managed to earn the trust of am a donor who provided absolution to their pressing issue – lack off finding mill in Kabu village.

“Patience pays”, Salwa Wani,  leader of one of the smallholder farmer groups dubbed peace federation in Kabu said ” If we lost hope and desolved this group and stop pushing for solutions for our challenges we would be still suffering”.

“Now God has heard our prayers and touched the heart of Duaghters of Mary Immaculate to bring for us this grinding mill which now marks the end of our suffering of going up to to Gudele to grind sorghum and maize and come back”.

Gudele market, the only place where women from Kabu access basic commodities and grinding mill for their disly consumption grains costs them between SSP 1000 -SSP 1300 to reach the market by boda-boda.

Some Impoverished women like Mama Sadia who could not afford the cost of bodi-boda have had always opted for treading across the long distance to access the grinding mill.

” We are finally free”, Sadia said “This has come after many years of our suffering. I thank DMI for bring our suffering to an end”.

Provided by Duaghters of Mary Immaculate (DMI) with support from Caritas Germany, the grinding mill will be operated and managed by the women themselves. Some of them have been trained by the Doshi Motors in technical handling of the machine..

The installation of the grinding mill at Kabu trading centre will now relieve the women from the burden of treading across the long distances and high transportation cost.

“We are going to ensure it’s good use because we have the skills and knowledge to maintain it in good condition”, Sadia said.

She added, ” Again, we are going to commercialize the mill so that we generate resources for it’s sustainability”.

The mill will grind maize, sorghum casava flour and dry okra. A big bracket of maize will cost SSP 800 while small bracket costs SSP 400, and a big bracket of sorghum and Cassava will cost SSP 600 while  the small bracket will be grounded at SSP 300.

“These charges are the same with the one they charge in Gudele, which means that our women can now serve the money and energy spent on transportation for doing other things,”, said Wilson Keri, Luri Payam gricuturaal Officer.

Me. Keri added, ” Our women have been suffering because of there was no grinding mill here in Kabu. Some of them gave up the growing of grains because of the difficulty in getting it ready for food”.