Greenhouses bring early harvest

Posted on October 20, 2009 by Amy Spindler

Here in Dombrachi, a remote village in Tajikistan near the Kyrgyz border, imposing snow-capped peaks and narrow valleys reflect a harsh daily life.

These peaks and valleys, where seven percent of the land is arable and winters are brutal, make it challenging for families to eat a healthy and diverse diet. Along with volatile weather, entrenched poverty undermines household food security throughout the country. In 2008, the United Nations appealed for $25 million in food aid for more than 250,000 Tajiks in need of immediate food assistance.

Delbar checks on her cucumbers. Growing tomatoes and cucumbers in a greenhouse means Delbar's first harvest is six weeks early. Photo: Amy Spindler/Mercy Corps

Mercy Corps has been working in Tajikistan since 1994; and one goal is to improve household food security in the Rasht region. Targeting pregnant women and mothers with children under age 2, more than 300 local volunteers teach seminars on such topics as breast-feeding, food preservation and greenhouse construction.

Delbar is one such volunteer in Domabrachi, where she teaches weekly seminars on improved agriculture techniques to this mostly Kyrgyz community. She has spent the past several months teaching women how to construct simple greenhouses and grow vegetables in them.

“We don’t have much land for planting and it’s cool year round,” she says on a drizzly July morning. “With a greenhouse, we get a harvest of cucumbers and tomatoes six weeks early.” Inside the warm greenhouse, she runs her fingers along melon vines and tiny peppers. She smiles. “We’re eating more healthfully now. Cucumbers are six somoni a kilogram at the market and nobody can afford six somoni. Now we eat from our greenhouses and use those six somoni to buy socks for our children.”

In the first half of 2009, families participating in the seminars built 832 greenhouses. Delbar laughs when she says that women now ask each other about their greenhouses as if they are children. “It’s the first thing we ask when we see each other. We ask for all the details.”

Every week, she instructs other women on agriculture practices, such as using compost, and looks forward to the next Mercy Corps training on canning, preserving and drying fruits and vegetables. She uses educational materials developed by Mercy Corps in the Kyrgyz language. “We do not speak Tajik well,” she says. “We’re so grateful to have materials in our native language.”

Surrounded by lush green vines and leaves, Delbar says that she loves her role as a Mercy Corps volunteer. “I’m growing along with these vegetables.”