Unfinished Business

You have to see it to be it!

I met a woman this week who is on a mission, and I'd like you to know her, too.

The Iowa Women in Agriculture Conference at the FFA Enrichment Center in Ankeny attracts women from across the state, but it's unusual when a woman travels 6,359 miles to attend.

Dr. Lynn Olisa from Abuja, Nigeria came for the first time last year. She stood up at the conference and told us that she wanted to bring other Nigerian women here in 2023. But we didn't realize that she would be so determined.

Photo by Lisa Christensen

This spring, she sent me an email, registering four other women and herself for the August 3 conference. Unfortunately, she contacted me again in late July, saying the four other women could not obtain a visa interview soon enough to arrive in Des Moines for our conference.

But Dr. Olisa was there, and this year I was able to learn more about why this 67-year-old woman is so passionate about women in agriculture. "I read about your conference on the internet," she said. "I know Iowa is the place for agriculture. The first year I came to your conference, it opened my eyes."

Olisa, who has a doctorate in public administration, grew up in Lagos, Nigeria, the former capital of Nigeria. Today she has the means to share her education and experience with farm women in her home country. "I'm educated, have my own money, and can talk," she says.

But life wasn't always so easy. Her husband died while their four children were young. "I had to work like hell to raise the children, and get my degree," she said. In recent years, she's become convinced that agriculture is the key to a better future for women – and for Nigeria. "I have a pig farm, goats, and two beef cows," she said. "I grow rice seedlings and sell to middleman." She hires women to help her care for the animals and grow the rice crop.

Working with a handful of other Nigerians, she helped create the Pathways Farmers Association. It's just been registered by the Nigerian Corporate Affairs Commission as an (NGO) non-governmental organization. "We want to train and educate African women in better, sustainable farming, starting in my country," she said. "We want to uplift and empower women. That is my challenge."

U.S. women gained credit in 1974

Olisa's goal of helping farm women to improve their lives resonates with me. As an editor at Successful Farming, I spent my early years there working with farm women to build their self-image and skill sets. “The most significant differences involve the roles of farm women," I wrote in 1995. "With few exceptions the lives of farm women have changed as much in the past 25 years as farming itself. Much of the change can be attributed to the rise of modern appliances. But the women's movement as well as the farm economy have played a role."

Other story headlines followed: "Farm women flex financial muscle," in 2004 and "New workshops help farm women hone business skills"; "The power of a farm woman," in 2005. "This Land is Her Land" in 2012 and "Ag Women on the Grow" a few years later.

Covering the World Food Prize Borlaug Dialogue also underscored the critical role that women in agriculture play in less developed countries. In 1998, I wrote, "Women produce 50% of food grown in the world. Many women don't have access to credit, farm inputs, research and new technology because they're not classified as farmers. As women's incomes grow, the money generally is spent on better food and water and safer housing for them and their children."

In Nigeria, a country of over 200 million people, hunger and malnutrition are ubiquitous. Research shows that if women had the same access to productive resources as men, they'd increase the yields of farms by 20%-30% and reduce hunger by up to 17%. In addition, women invest their profits back into their households, helping to alleviate poverty from the bottom up.

Olisa confirmed to me that change has been slow to come. "If women farmers in Nigeria have a loving husband, it is better," she said. "But some husbands take the money. Women do not have their own money or bank accounts. Women do all the farm work, but have no credit."  Nigerian women grow okra, melon, potatoes, bananas, and corn, and raise poultry. "Some have fishery, but too many dangers from mercury in the water," she said.

Pathways Farmers Association is establishing connections at Texas A & M, and in Georgia to help with business training. "If we can train women to produce better yields and expand land, they can contribute to the house, the society and community, and husbands value them more," Olisa said. "Now, there's only one, the husband, called the farmer."

Cultural barriers for women

Olisa also is attempting to work for change by getting involved in Nigeria's politics. She said Nigeria recently passed a law, The Violence Against Persons (Prohibition Act) to punish men who batter their wives.  Widows also are especially vulnerable. The new law prevents in-laws from taking over the possession of property belonging to the late husband, as well as forced marriages between widows and their deceased husbands' brothers. One of the discriminatory cultural practices outlawed is forcing a widow to drink the bath water of her deceased husband to prove her innocence of any allegation.

Legislation alone is not enough to change society’s views on women’s property rights. It can create hostility between men and women in such a patriarchal society. But achieving gender equality is crucial to reducing poverty and creating food security. Limiting women’s rights to land and other assets sabotages the potential to increase food production, reduce hunger, and limit malnutrition.

"I commend you," Olisa told me and other farm women at our conference. "You are strong. I want the women to come back with me and see what happens with women in agriculture joined together. Women have their own associations in my country, but not farming. We want to teach them by training the trainer. So the chain continues."

Olisa obviously believes in the words of tennis champion, Billie Jean King, "You have to see it to be it."

Photo by Lisa Christensen

She told me the four Nigerian women still have visa interviews, but they'll lose the money they've paid unless they can come to the U.S. for a conference or summit sometime in October. I told her the dates of the World Food Prize Borlaug Dialogue are October 24-26, and both Olisa and I have sent emails there. As we wait for a response, Olisa said  she wants to try again to bring women from Pathways Farmers Association to the Iowa Women in Agriculture Conference next August. "I need grants to help get them here," she said.

Women in less developed countries are the workforce for food production, yet they have very little or no access to the very basic tools of food production. Closing the gender gap in agriculture supports women in their struggle to obtain the rights to land ownership and access to the right tools.

“Farming can grow a nation,” Olisa told me. Her plan is for Pathways Farmers Association to apply for farmland that can be allocated to Nigerian women to grow food. “It’s a big dream,” she said.

“Hold fast to dreams

for if dreams die

life is a broken-winged bird

that cannot fly.

Hold fast to dreams

for when dreams go

Life is a barren field

frozen with snow.”

Langston Hughes

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