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It has been 18
years since I began my career as a development consultant to
assist developing countries in agricultural and regional
development planning. During the time, I have taken part in
various research and project planning works in 29 countries.
They range from large projects at the national policy level of the
recipient countries to small ones aimed at improving the living
standards of farmers in rural areas, and they are different every
time. Regardless, with every one of them comes grave social
responsibility, and no matter how many times I have done the work,
I can't take it easy. You could say it's a trying job, but
as trying as it is, the sense of accomplishment you would get upon
completing it is enormous, so it is very much worth doing.
Of the small works I have done
recently, there is this study in Malawi, in which I participated
for 3 years starting in 1998. It is a comprehensive study by
MAFF, which had been carried out in 5 countries since 1993, to
identify the methodology that would lead to self-sustainable
agriculture as Japan proceeds with cooperative effort for
agricultural development in African countries. In this
study, I was assigned to be the leader of the 5-member study team.
Thinking that sustainable
development would be made possible by active participation of
local residents in its effort, I tried to involve them in the
planning by holding meetings with them at every step of the study.
Based on their input, I made a draft plan formulating various
hypotheses and presented it to them. It was a very enjoyable
process to adjust the plan listening to their ideas. Let me
tell you about one example of the process.
[Trans.: TS]
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Of the problems in the
village, revealed by our study on the existing conditions, there was
shortage of food and safe domestic water. Due to the lack of
irrigated water, the villagers can barely plant any crop during the
dry season that lasts for 6 months. Moreover, as for their
domestic water that relies on groundwater, the wells would dry up
during the dry season, and the water quality would deteriorate during
the rainy season because rainwater and muddy water would mix, causing
diseases such as cholera and diarrhea to proliferate.
In order to solve these problems, we
suggested that they construct a deep well with a hand-pump and they
use the water for both domestic water and irrigation. For we
thought that the supply of safe water would reduce incidents of
water-derived diseases and in the meantime make it possible to plant
crops, despite small acreage, during the dry season. This
suggestion won unanimous approval from the farmers, and they ordered a
local contractor to construct the well.
When we visited the village again for
the follow-up study in the dry season after the completion of the
well, the farmers welcomed us with singing and dancing. They had
set up a beautiful cooperative farm, with a variety of vegetables
planted, and irrigated it with the water from the well. The
farmers were joyful with safe water, too. One of the female
farmers told me that those vegetables not only became a source of cash
income but also were consumed by farmers, improving their diet in
terms of nutrition.
What we did was to provide a well with a
hand-pump, but the local farmers had understood what to do with the
water through the discussions with us. It was a study that made
me realize once again the importance of communication with local
residents as the principal player in development.
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Agriculture
is indeed a very broad field involving all sorts of
things. No matter how I try to get used to it, it's a
tiring work to pay attention evenly to all of those things;
from natural conditions including climate and soil, style of
farming operation, crops to be planted, agricultural
technology, financial performance, material investment and
distribution of agricultural products, access to market,
post-harvest processing, agro-processing, infrastructure such
as irrigation and roads, and research and propagation, to such
social aspects as gender role, farmers' organizations and land-related
institutions.
You would certainly become able
to sort out problems common among developing countries in big
"bundles" as you build your experience.
However, what would make you always wonder and ponder are
things concerned with the local "people", the
principal player in development. For me, who grew up in
a local city with no farming experience, it didn't come easy
to imagine how farmers whose main source of income is farming
live, what they think, and what they want.
In the beginning, I studied
problems and concerns of farmers and rural people through
interviews and group discussions. However, there were
only a few cases in which I was able to identify the object
that would satisfy their needs based on the results of such
studies and formulate a project with confidence. Now I
think I myself was responsible for that because I had only
scholarly knowledge but not much contact with actual farming
and rural communities.
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Having
realized it relatively early in my consulting career, I
started to yearn to put myself where I could be close to
agriculture. Then, however belatedly, I moved to Hodaka
town of Nagano (where the 1998 Winter Olympics were held) in
March of 1995, and started my training to become a farmer.
My life made a complete about-face. Farmwork subject to
the weather, everyday mood depending on weather forecast, long
hours of work from dawn till dusk during the busy season, work
calendar having nothing to do with days of the week, huge gap
in life between the busy season and the slack season, love
towards crops, joy at harvest and fear of natural disasters,
etc. First I felt distance when I talked with my
neighbor farmers, but lately I have become able to talk at the
same eye-level with them without being conscious about it.
To local farmers with long
experience, my farming would probably look disconcertingly
precarious. Be that as it may, this is a very important
learning process to me. There is still much to be
learned, but hoping that someday this experience will be
applied to my work overseas, my farmer's training will go on.
[Trans.: TS]
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