Meet Polly. She's a smallholder farmer from Uganda working to promote sustainable agriculture and the status of women farmers in her country.
Next week, ActionAid Australia will welcome Polly for a two-week speaking tour for rural communities across New South Wales and Victoria.
Polly is scheduled to arrive in Sydney on 18 June, and will travel to Orange, Bellingen and Armidale before finishing her trip in Melbourne (no public events) at the end of the month.
Polly (her full name is Ocola Apio Polly) comes to us from a small town in a drought-prone region of eastern Uganda, where she lives with her husband and 11 children. She grows oranges, groundnuts, cowpeas and cassava on 10 acres of family-owned land, which she uses to feed her family and make a living.
Polly is also an influential leader in her community, spearheading the creation of a co-op for women farmers that pools community resources to build up local food stocks.
Women farmers like Polly play a critical role in ending hunger around the world. According to an ActionAid report released last year, women farmers produce 60 to 80 percent of food in developing nations, though many are barred from owning farmland and are excluded from agricultural aid programs. According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation, closing the agriculture gender gap could reduce the number of hungry people by 12 - 17 percent worldwide. That's roughly 100 million people.
ActionAid's Fertile Ground campaign is aimed at supporting women farmers like Polly to protect food security in the most vulnerable communities. Here in Australia, ActionAid is calling on the government to make good on its $464.2m food security commitment under the G8's L'Aquila Food Security Initiative.
ActionAid is also urging the Australian government to push for financial and political support for women farmers in the G20. During her time in Australia, Polly will show exactly why those food commitments are critical to smallholder farmers and their families.
So why not come to one of Polly's talks and meet her in person. If you're interested in coming along to any of the events, contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
