Before I connected with the Women’s Spaces project, life was difficult. Being a parent is difficult, especially when you are a mother who cannot always provide everything your family needs. Some of my children cannot receive financial assistance, so I have to provide for them. At the time, we were relying on the financial assistance of just one of my children to help support the family. I also have two grandchildren who I help provide for, so my responsibilities continued to grow.

I became involved with the Women’s Spaces project in 2022. Through Socio-Economic Rights Institute (SERI), I attended the Women’s Forum and participated in workshops about political participation. We saw that through Women’s Spaces project, we could receive support as women in the Slovo community and learn how to become better leaders.

Through the project, we also had the opportunity to travel to Kenya for an exchange with Mazingira Institute, where we learned about different approaches to farming. We learned about growing vegetables, poultry farming, and even rabbit farming. The experience opened our eyes to many new possibilities. The workshops also helped us become better leaders because we learned more about our rights to land and housing.

We didn’t keep the skills we learned to ourselves. We brought that knowledge back to our community, where we recruited more farmers and taught others about farming. Even after the training and exchange were finished, we continued using what we had learned to start other vegetable farms.

Since then, there has been a lot of change in my life. I now raise chickens and sell them to earn an income, which helps me buy all kinds of groceries for my family. I also sell the eggs, but we use some of them at home too.