Assoungha District, Ouaddaï region. A typical family housing in the chadian bush between the city of Hadjer Hadid and the village of Ourkoulong.
In the village of Amleyouna, Ouara district, Ouaddaï region, some women weed a commun plot, along a wadi (a dry river bed). The plot belongs to a private owner who lends it to the group of female farmers, in return for getting the usufruct. Several tenths of beneficiaries, selected by committees of villages benefit of advises by agricultural technicians paid by an NGO. They repeat the learnt technics in their own plots.
In the village of Amleyouna, Ouara district, Ouaddaï region, female farmers fill makeshift watering cans from a well, to water a commun plot that they have planted with onions and garlic. The plot belongs to a private owner who lends it to the group of female farmers, in return for getting the usufruct. Several tenths of beneficiaries, selected by committees of villages benefit of advises by agricultural technicians paid by an NGO. They repeat the learnt technics in their own plots.
In the village of Amleyouna, Ouara district, Ouaddaï region, two female farmers load a donkey with agricultural inputs (tools, seeds) given by an NGO. More than rewarding regular attendance, these inputs allow beneficiaries of a training program to get the technical means to cultivate their family plots with suitable tool and input. Traditionally, the women are in charge of work in the fields.
In the village of Amleyouna, Ouara district, Ouaddaï region, women review the situation about the work in their commun plot and wait to get some agricultural inputs (seeds, tools) given by an NGO. More than rewarding regular attendance, these inputs allow beneficiaries of a training program to get the technical means to cultivate their family plots with suitable tool and input. Traditionally, the women are in charge of work in the fields.
Few kilometers away from the village of Malanga, Ouara district, Houra Hassan, 27 years old and her three daughters, are sitting on the only bed in the hut. In her arms, she holds Mariam, 9 months, on the left is Adijo, 3 years and a half and Adija, 5 years on the right. The girls have successively suffer from malnutrition, during a period when Houra had difficulties to feed herself, thus to produce milk. She learnt the existence of malnutrition in the Health Center. She ignores its existence before, thinking that her daughters were « only » sick. In the future, she would liker her daughters to go to school, then to get their own plot, as she does. Presently, there is not school in the village as the parents did not manage to gather enough money to pay for a teacher.
Mourra village, Ouara district, Ouaddaï region. Angoussa AMBOGENE whose age is estimated to be betweenn 90 and 100 years rests in her bed, at home. Her grand- daughter, who helps her to sustain although she is already taking care of more than 20 persons, lives few hundreds meters away. Her ick husband, lives in a different hut, at the end of the street.
In the vicinity of Malanga, a village located 70 kilometers north of Abeche, a group of women and children shelter from the blazing sun in a hut, during a ceremony organized for the return of the son of the hostess, a young State-certified in the University of Abeche.
Mourra village, Ouara district. Angoussa AMBOGENE (left), whose age is estimated between 90 and 100 years is escorted back home by a friend of her family.
Assoungha district. In the Koranic school of Fodji, five pupils make up the writing course that they missed the day before. This school counts 27 students. Because of lack of income, the local population do not always manage to register its children in the Governmental school, while the Koranic school is always affordable.
The village of Mourra, Ouara district, is located alongside a wadi, a sandy dry river bed during dry season and that becomes un river with a strong current during the rainy season. Along its banks, in some vegetable gardens, the inhabitants grow oignons, garlic, ... Hawaï Handur, a widow since les than a year, aged 48 years old, hurries towards her market garden, where 5 of her children work since morning. The land is bad there, too much sandy. Hawaï lost her first plot of good ground because of a rising of the nearby wadi, during rains season. To help her, her brother in law granted her a small piece of land clearly less rich than the previous one. With no incomes, she does not manage to pay for her children school fees. Anyway, she needs their workforce to cultivate and bring back home something to eat. She already borrowed 75.000 CFA to a trader of the village. The 5 onions bags expected out of the harvest (sold from 5.500 to 10.000 CFA) won’t cover the debt, alas...
Nakoulouta village, Ouara district. A female farmer throws a thorny bough to fill in a breach in the fence of takiye (fence composed by partition walls made of straw), which surrounds the vegetable farming gardens, to keep at distance the domestic animals, very fond of vegetable and who can devastate the fields.
Nakoulouta village, Ouara district. A female farmer waters her piece of land planted with onions by emptying a bucket in the network of channel fit out around the different square of land of cultivation. Her family rents the plot with the well in Sudanese pounds. Close to the border, many transaction are done using that foreign money, although the official currency in Chad is the CFA Franc. Often, people prefer to shift the plot following every harvest, which cause a change in the planted crop. Following onion come rocket, salad, gombo, garlic.
In Nakoulouta village, close to the city of Borota, in Assoungha district, Ouaddaï region, Fatimé Abdu Ibrahim, 17 years old (orange loincloth, right) helps her mother (foreground, right), her two aunts (pink and black loincloth) and a mother’s cousin, to harvest onions in a plot rented by the family, next to a wadi. Fatima takes a training in horticulture given by an NGO, hoping that she will train other women herself. She has discovered thanks to the training, soils enrichment, the planting using regular and minimum intervals. She cannot wait to see the result of these technical implementation in the family plots. Indeed, the family rents another plot two hundred meters away. Not yet married, Fatima do not possess her own plot of land. This is her main goal with getting married.
Middle of morning in Hamra (red in chadian arabic) wadi, in Kouchaguine village, Ouara district. A young girl gives water to her cows. The wadi is called so because, during the rainy season, a red mud is carried along by water coming from Sudan, giving an ochre color to the river.
Sunday morning, in the vicinity of Hadjer-Hadid, a group of young girls rides their donkeys to pay a visit to a friend in a neighbouring village.
In Kouchaguine village, in the wadi Hamra (red in chadian arabic), in Ouara district, Houra Hassan, 27 years old and her three daughters, ride back from the wadi where they went to collect water. The wadi is called red because, during the rainy season, a red mud is carried along by water coming from Sudan, giving an ochre color to the river. In her arms, Houra holds Mariam, 9 months, while Adijo, 3 years holds the neckline of mount. Behind her mother, Adija, 5 years holds on to the saddle. The girls have successively suffer from malnutrition, during a period when Houra had difficulties to feed herself, thus to produce milk. She learnt the existence of malnutrition in the Health Center. She ignores its existence before, thinking that her daughters were « only » sick. In the future, she would liker her daughters to go to school, then to get their own plot, as she does. Presently, there is not school in the village as the parents did not manage to gather enough money to pay for a teacher.
In Malanga, a village located 70 kilometers north of Abeche, a young woman keeps an eye on to whom she he's just given some fodder. These are the mounts of women who came to take part in an information meeting about malnutrition, organized by a female farmer, at home.
A group of young girls walk around in the village walks around in the village of Moura, Ouara district, at the end of afternoon, while the heatwave of the days has fallen back.
Mourra village, Ouara district. Meriam Barh (right), 46 years old, helped by her husband (standing), her children, her sister et some neighbors weed her vegetable garden located behind her house, along the wadi. She sustain more than 20 persons : her 9 children, her older daughter’s who studies in Abeche to be a nurse, her 6 sister’s who left the village for health reasons, her sick husband, her grand-children, some nieces and nephews and living few hundreds meters away, her almost disabled hundred-year-old grandparents.To make ends meet, she has to borrow money from a trader or to work in the fields of other farmers. For her, it is unthinkable to give up sending her 6 children to school, despite the the additional charge that it represents. Thanks to the technics that she learns by working in a common plot of land with other female farmers, she hopes to acquire the needed technics to improve her yield, to sell surplus in the market and to get out of debts.
Mourra village, Ouara district. Hawaï Handur, a widow and some of her children. Two elders daughters are married, live in N’Djamena the capital city and are not borne by her anymore. Another son is apprentice lorry driver in Abeche, the big city in Ouaddaï. Hawaï is desperate. Her pregnant daughter is sick, lying in the bed. She took her to Abeche to get her treated, to buy drugs but it did not work out. She took her back home. Since, she is confined to bed. « I think that even in the future, I will always be poverty-stricken. The soil of my plot of land is too poor. »
Mourra village, Ouara disctrict. In the yard of her family plot, Tijani IBRAHIM, 27 years old, mother of 4, spreads some millet on a tarpaulin to dry it. Her 2 years and a half son, Ashta Saleh has been a victim of malnutrition.
In Mourra village, Ouara district, Adjoua Abakar, 19 years old, mother of two girls (23 months old Intizar Youssouf and two years and a half Halima Youssouf) fills a jerrican with water collect from a well in the middle of a wadi next to her home. Her husband has left 2 years ago to work in golden mines in the Tibesti, the far away northern region of Chad. She did not get any news since. He does not send any money. Intizar suffered from severe malnutrition and is still monitored bu the Health Center. To earn some money, Adjoua Abakar sells grilled grasshoppers in the near-by market.
In a family plot in the village of Ourkoulong, Assoungha district, some women prepares the meal.
Talhay village, Ouaddaï district. In the hamlet where only the relatives of Ibrahim Abdelkarim, a farmer, live, one of his son reinforce the wooden fence and the thorny tree which support and protect the fodder to feed the animals during the lean period.
In the vicinity of the village of Talhay, Ouaddaï district.
In Malanga, a village located 70 kilometers north of Abeche,. Women gather outside of Fatouma Ahmat’s house to take part in an information meeting about malnutrition.
In the vicinity of Malanga, a village located 70 kilometers north from Abeche, a woman holds in her arms her son, apparently malnourished, during a party.
In Malanga, a village located 70 kilometers north of Abeche, Fatouma Ahmat, 36 years old organize an information meeting in her place. Female neighbors came to listen and to ask questions. Sick following the birth of Hassan, her latest born, she was not producing enough milk to breast-feed him, dragging her son in malnutrition. Once cured, she discovered that many children in the surroundings were in the same state than her son. She said ti herself that it could be good to help her « sisters » and the community by detecting and guiding towards a health center, the concerned children and families.
In Malanga, a village located 70 kilometers north from Abeche. Daoud, a community worker from the nearby health center vaccinates the children against polio. He gets 20.000 CFA per month plus a bonus of 2.500/day, during screening and mass vaccination campaign.
Regional hospital of Abeche, Ouara district. The interior yard of the Pediatric Section. On a newly painted wall a symbolic picture : a chicken and a rooster protecting their chick from an attacking bird of prey.
Regional hospital of Abeche, Ouara district. In a dormitory of the Pediatric Section, women who came to visit two friends whose children have been admitted, discuss.
Regional hospital of Abeche, Ouara district. The mother of Rashida, 3 days, infected by pre-natal tetanus, look upon the sleep of her daughter, in a dormitory of Pediatric Section.
Assoungha district, health center of Hadjer Hadid. Micheline Makingabeye a mid-wife paid by an NGO and made available to the Chadian Health services sounds a pregnant patient. The later come on a regular base to the Health Center. Traditional matron operating in the 63 villages and the 5 area related to Hadjer Hadid health center encourage the women to consult regularly and to deliver there.
Assoungha district. The bush between Hadjer Hadid city and the village of Ourkoulong. An old woman comes to visit a friend, carrying on her back the child of her daughter who work in the family vegetable garden somewhere along a wadi, few kilometers away.
Assoungha district, village of Ourkoulong. Three young women monitored by Maryam BIRKE, the traditional matron of the village : Mariam Abubakar 20 years old, Fatime Ali Issak 24 years old and Mariam Omar 24 years old.
Mariam, waiting for her second child goes regularly to pre-natal visits in the Health Center of Hadjer Hadid, two hours walk away. At the time of her latest visit, Mariam was so exhausted that she sat on the side of the path, in the bush, to recover, unable to walk back home. Maryam, the matron coming back from her work in Hadjer Hadid found her and took her back home. Her first child, Abdulaï is born in the village, thanks to Maryam, the matron.
Fatime has 3 children, including Ali 4 months old, in her arms. Maryam helped her to deliver her first daughter Fatime in the village.
Mariam Omar has 3 children. The first one was born in the village, the second in the Health Center. As for the latest one, he is born on the side of the road, when his mother was coming back from field work. She wanted to reach the Health Center, but did not have the time... Fortunately, Maryam the matron helped her.
No husbands is in the village. They all left looking for a job and money in N’Djamena, the capital city, in the Tibesti or in the city of Tine.
Mourra village, Ouara district. Fatima Ahmat Seïd, a 35 years old matron visits a young pregnant woman in the family courtyard.
Once, there was a meeting when the chief of the village said: « Every time, the men are the ones who assist for the births. We need a matron ! » Fatima had a sister who was a mid-wife in a heath center. She was often going at her work place to observer her. One day, a woman needed assistance to give birth. Fatima did it and started her carrier.
Ourkoulong village, Assoungha district. Maryam BIRKE, a 38 years matron, employed in the Health Center of Hadjer Hadid, 2 hours walk from there, auscults in her house a 20 years old patient, Mariam Abubakar, waiting for her second child.
Maryam has learnt the job with her old aunt Sherife Ngokol and was appointed because of a tragedy. Sherife assisted as usual by her niece Maryam undertook to help her daughter to deliver. The delivery turned badly. The young woman died. So did her baby. This traumatic event hampered Sherife to continue her activity. When a new delivery had to be done in the village, the old aunt said to her niece: « I am too weak to do the job. You are able to do it, you know the gesture. » From now on, Sherife assists Maryam. Ultimate sign of trust and esteem, Sherife asked Maryam to clean and bury her daughter.
Since her beginning in 2006, Maryam has helped 35 women to give birth.
Under a tree, at the periphery of Fodji village, close to Hadjer-Hadid city, in Assoungha district, a staff of an NGO enlisted the women amongst the 300 people who came (73 men and 245 women) to attend an information session about Health. When finished, jerricans, bleach, soap, filtering veils will be distributed. Subject of the day: how to purify the water to reduce diseases related to the consumption of water collected in the wadi.
Under a tree, at the periphery of Fodji village, close to Hadjer-Hadid city, in Assoungha district, women who attend an information session about Health. When finished, jerricans, bleach, soap, filtering veils will be distributed. Subject of the day: how to purify the water to reduce diseases related to the consumption of water collected in the wadi.
Under a tree, at the periphery of Fodji village, close to Hadjer-Hadid city, in Assoungha district, Ouaddaï region, more than 300 persons (73 men and 245 women) attend an information session about Health. When finished, jerricans, bleach, soap, filtering veils will be distributed. Subject of the day: how to purify the water to reduce diseases related to the consumption of water collected in the wadi.