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Al Jazeera
Al Jazeera
Environment
Peter Yeung

In Sierra Leone’s swamps, female farmers make profits and peace

The Ministry of Agriculture says that yield in Matagelema’s swamps is 2 metric tonnes of rice per hectare – more than triple the 0.6 metric tonnes average for uplands [Peter Yeung/Al Jazeera]

Matagelema, Sierra Leone – Not long after daybreak in Matagelema, a village in the south of Sierra Leone’s Moyamba District, a jubilant chorus rings out from a stretch of a once-neglected swamp surrounded by tropical forest.

“When we are ploughing, people are getting jealous,” dozens of women farmers sing gleefully, ankle-deep in mud in a sprawling paddy field.

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