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Up Close … with Sandra Sinon,

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Up Close … with Sandra Sinon, Empty Up Close … with Sandra Sinon,

Post  Sirop14 Tue Jul 15, 2014 8:30 pm

Up Close … with Sandra Sinon, agricultural research assistant and chairperson of Femme Développement Durable et Securité Alimentaire Seychelles (FDDSAS)

15-July-2014
‘Encouraging women’s effort in preserving

locally made food products is our priority’

By Marie-Anne Lepathy

She has always loved gardening, doing it at home when she was still at school, but practicing it as a profession was not her first choice; she hadSandra Sinon preferred to work in the soil laboratory testing samples related to agricultural development instead.

Today Sandra Sinon is an agricultural research assistant, working for the Seychelles Agricultural Agency (SAA). She has been in the field for 15 years now and for the past 11 years, she is based at the Anse Boileau Research Station.

Her work includes carrying out crop research in terms of nutrients, pests, diseases, and water management and also adaptability potential of different crops.
For the past three years, she has been more involved in the eggplant shoot and fruit borer pest management using bio pesticide, nutrient management in leafy crops (using only organic fertilisers), adaptability potential of root crop on Praslin and sustainability of agro ecological practices.

“I always wanted to do something that did not involve staying in the office all day long hence when the lab was not running to full capacity in 2003, I made a request to be transferred to the Research Station which has more field work and more challenges and I have never regretted my decision,” Sandra says.

Earlier this year Sandra was elected chairperson of the local platform of the Femme Développement Durable et Sécurite Alimentaire Seychelles (FDDSAS) or Women Sustainable Development and Food Security.

“The main aim of such a platform is to give value to the effort of all women, contributing towards sustainable development and food security,” Sandra points out.

She stresses that encouraging women’s effort in preserving locally made food products is the priority of the platform.

She notes that in Seychelles, many women are doing something to add value to fruit, vegetables and root crops; preserving harvests in the form of jam, pickles or chips. But these women are not necessarily doing it for money and exploring the potentials of these activities as fully fledge businesses. Some women just make those preserves for home use or to share with friends and neighbours while a few of them may bring the products to the local fairs such as Bazar Labrin, Bazar Victoria, Bazar Ovan or to the Creole Festival activities.

Sandra goes on to remark that more and more homes have fruit trees in their backyards these days and during the fruit seasons when the fruits are in abundance a large number goes to waste, since the home owners do not have the know-how or time to preserve them.

“The platform will encourage indigenous knowledge sharing on value addition by getting the women who know how to preserve, to come forward and share their knowledge with others, school children among them,” Sandra explains.

She said the platform will also create a network to allow those with skills and know-how to access those who can supply the excess fruit, hence both will be able to derive an income from the fruit.

“The main outcome of such an initiative is to safeguard indigenous knowledge of food preservation and value addition, create employment opportunities, generate income for households, increase the supply of locally made food products thus contributing towards food security,” Sandra explains.

Affiliation with Indian Ocean Commission (IOC) projects

Prior to her involvement with the FDDSAS Sandra, back in 2011, took part in the Initiative Régionale Agroécologie Changement Climatique (IRACC) project of the Indian Ocean Commission, which included identifying and promoting agro-ecological practices in countries of the IOC region. It was through the project – of which she is the local communication correspondent – that she was nominated along with two other women to attend a meeting in December 2011 in Madagascar.
The aim was to discuss propositions to set up a platform for women engaged in sustainable development and food security in each member state and eventually a regional platform for the region.

“At the end of the meeting it was agreed that national and regional platforms Femme Développement Durable et Sécurité Alimentaire be established before 2015 and each participant had to go back and educate woman on the aim of such a platform,” Sandra explains.

“This has taken time since it was a new initiative and we all have other commitments,” Sandra says. But eventually each country managed to set up its platform.

Sandra recalls she rallied a number of women with keen interest in the project and with help from the IOC they drafted their constitution and elected their first committee with her as the chairperson.

“I believe the women appreciated the fact that I had managed to bring together women either individually or from different associations and since I was the one involved from the start, they agreed I was well placed to lead the platform with their support,” Sandra points out.

Members of the platform are individual women, who on their own or through their association are in one way or another contributing towards sustainable development and food security in the Seychelles.

“At present, we have women who are actively involved on an individual basis, or through their organisation or association such as Sustainability for Seychelles, Envirotech, Val d’Andorre Farmers’ Association, WASO, Life and Water Seychelles, Ministry of Environment, Seychelles Agricultural Agency, teachers, Wildlife Club of Seychelles, and a member of the National Assembly,” notes Sandra.

Sandra believes with her background in agriculture, more specifically through her training in conservation agriculture, agro-ecology, which stress on sustainable agriculture, she will be able to contribute her knowledge and skills to help enhance the individual effort of the women members of the platform.

Sandra’s sincere hope is that the platform achieves its aim in helping all women, however small the contribution they are making towards food security to better their lives by giving more value to their products thus increasing their incomes.

More about Sandra – family and leisure time

Originally an inhabitant of Morne Blanc, Sandra attended primary to secondary 2 at Port Glaud school and completed S3 and S4 at Grand Anse Mahé. She went to the National Youth Service in 1995, where she was awarded for the best overall contributor to village life for girls.

“I continued my education at the Seychelles Polytechnic between1996 -1998 at the School of Foundation Studies for my ‘O’ levels and the School of Humanities and Sciences for my ‘A’ levels,” Sandra recalls.

For the past 12 years, since she got married, the 36-year-old mother of three is living at Anse Aux Pins.

In spite of her more busy family life with young children Sandra still makes time for some home gardening. But she admits that the wellbeing of her family and education of her children are her priority.

Her spare time is mostly spent with her children, taking them to places especially the beach.

“But I also like to keep up to date with news and mostly programmes related to agriculture either on television or radio,” says Sandra.

She adds that networking online with other people in her field of work is something she enjoys. She takes part in online discussions on relevant topics and also keeps in touch with friends through Facebook.

Overall Sandra says she is happy with her life though she admits there are areas she would like to improve.

“With my growing family, I definitely need another house and would like to move to the district where I grew up since there is ample space for home gardening there and it has a more children friendly environment,” Sandra says pensively.

“As for my job, I am satisfied, since it is something I enjoy doing. I feel content when I succeed in building trust with farmers and other stakeholders and manage to come up with solutions for their problems. It is not always easy, but I enjoy the challenge,” she admits.

http://www.nation.sc/article.html?id=242324

Sirop14

Posts : 26457
Join date : 2008-06-02

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