RADIO SERIES second episode

20/07/09

Today, Sunday July 20, 2009 is the day scheduled for the second episode of our radio program, “Women farmers’ Meeting” but disaster seems to have struck the radio sets in Gwagwada.  OKAY, all the women members of the listeners’ club are seated by 01.30pm; a whole hour before the broadcast! Imagine that! Sundays also happen to be the meeting days for the newly-formed cooperative society/radio listeners’ club so everything is looking good. Then, we notice something a little off. No one seems to have brought a radio! We had talked about purchasing a radio set for the listeners’ clubs but the community members had assured us that there was no need since everyone has a radio at home which can easily be borrowed on meeting days.  We ask the president why they haven’t brought a radio and she tells us a funny story. In order not to waste time, we rush from underneath our mango tree meeting place and into the house of the sole administrator, which is close by. As always, he is happy to see us but delivers the sad news that someone took his radio two days ago and he is yet to replace it. So his wife goes to ask the pastor and comes back with a radio that wouldn’t power on. By now, it is 2:10p.m, 20 minutes to program start.  In our desperation, we try to tune the radio in the taxi we came in but the sound is not clear. Just at the nick of time, I mean, just as the program is getting started, a very quiet, unassuming lady in the group returns with a radio and it works! Halleluiah! All the women rush close to the entrance of the sole administrator’s parlour and we all listen to the radio program and several women pay for airtime and take turns to phone in to make their voices heard, making contributions to the discussions or asking questions.

A listeners’ club member phoning the radio station during the live broadcast.

 

 

 

 

 

After the program is ended, we realize why these women did not bring a radio to the meeting. Apparently their husbands had commandeered the radios in order to listen to the program in their various homes.  The sole administrator saves the day and subsequent shows by publicly promising to buy the women a radio before next Sunday and from what we now know of our women, they will definitely hold him to his promise.

Christy Sunday: a member of the listeners club filming the event.

Today has been a good day. We chat with the women for several minutes after the radio show ends and also record some of their opinions which we plan to air next week.  During the chat, the women discuss and ask for clarification on some issues.  They go as far as asking questions about soft loans from the micro finance bank and we assure them that in three weeks time, an expert on that topic (a Gbagyi-speaking guest) would be in the studio during the program to educate them on how to go about obtaining loan facilities and they would then have the opportunity to call in and ask questions. Everyone was excited and pleased that the listener’s club held in spite of the lack of a radio at the start of the meeting.

 

It’s Christy’s turn today to film the Listeners’ club’s meeting proceedings.

The topic of radio program today, was Water Management and Irrigation Farming. Once again, we got the relevant scripts from the Farm Radio International’s web-site (www.farmradio.org).  The chairman of the local government also spoke to the women on the plans the government has to assist women.  

We’ll be back next week with more reports after the radio show!

Data, Seember and Binta

Radio Series

12/07/09

 

 

In keeping with its pledge to seriously promote the forthcoming Gbagyi radio series dedicated to women farmers, Kaduna state Radio, our partner in the implementation of Majalisar Mata Manoma: a Meeting Place for Women Farmers connecting with Radio and Mobile phones, advertized the program daily for three weeks prior to the launch.

Time has finally arrived and in a few minutes, the radio program will commence… We are hitting the airwaves folks! Being the first show, the program will be formally introduced to listeners who are at liberty to call sometime during the broadcast. Also, we will be addressing issues with regards to water scarcity which is undeniably, a major concern for families in our focus community (Gwagwada).

We just got the “studio time” wave alert so we will see you on the other side……

 

We all (ARDA) are on the other side of the show glass while the presenter and the Gbagyi woman leader are on air. Using scripts sourced from Farm Radio International’s website and adapted to suit our purposes, the show takes off. On our side of the glass, we chat lightly all the while snapping and filming pictures, anxious and wondering if there would actually be callers. The presenter plays a pre-recorded vox-pop and we think “ok, now, where are the callers?” Then 8 minutes into the show, just when we are thinking we would have to rely on our recorded discussions and interviews, the phone rings and thereafter, it continues to ring off the hook. We all couldn’t be more pleased. Different people and surprisingly, many women call in and relate the issues they face because of water; the cleanliness of water, the scarcity and such related issues. A few solutions are proffered by the experts and we know it, time is up. So the presenter tells everyone to tune in next week for more solutions. He also encourages people who have found ways of managing water effectively to share their experiences by calling in to the next episode.

 Confession time: Ok, it was not all about farming as one caller actually called to ask where he could get the music that was played. You see, we used the indigenous music of the Gbagyi people as a means to endear them to the program and by and large we were happy with the outcome.

 

Backstage, after the program ends, ARDA and our consultants discuss consequent follow up and hire someone to transcribe and transcribe the episodes into English for us.

Next week, we will be on the ground at Gwagwada to monitor the progress and reception of the women and men of our listeners clubs. We have lined up another expert to address other aspects of the water issues raised and we have also identified and downloaded some other scripts from Farm Radio international’s website to complement the expert guest’s talk. Stay tuned ’cos this project will only get better. Amen!