TRANSCRIPT

Jingye (Dave) Tang (Host): Micro-entrepreneurs are the most common type of business in the world and this is especially the case in developing countries. Who are they? What do they do? And what motivates them? What are the challenges they are facing? Some of these answers might surprise you. 

Today we will take you to the perspective of an agricultural entrepreneur from the Solomon Islands. This is his story.

Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening to everyone. Welcome to the Grassroots in Action, where we catch up on grassroots experiences and practice that impact one person, one community at a time. 

I’m Dave Tang, and I am a correspondent of the 2022 Global Correspondent Program. 

Our guest of honor today is Lesley Sanga, an agriculture microentrepreneur from the Solomon Islands. After spending 5 years working as a journalist in the Solomon Islands, Lesley changed his career and started to engage in farming in 2019. 

As an entrepreneur he has established a farmer school in Solomon Islands teaching methods in organic farming as opposed to using chemical fertilizers, how to farm in sloppy areas and flat lands, how to adapt to climate change, and how to clean and plant in general. He also collects local taro species to taro bulking. He is also active in community development as the President of World of Youth Commission.

It is very lovely to meet you today, Lesley!


Lesley Sanga (Guest): Thank you so much!


Dave (Host): We are going to begin our conversation today with what motivated you and made you change your career path from a journalist to an agricultural entrepreneur. I am really curious about this.


Lesley (Guest): Just to start, as you mentioned, my name is Lesley Sanga and I come from one of the central parts of Malaita province, a remote community there. 

Just to be brief, the reason why I changed from my career – from journalism to agriculture – is something that I have been thinking about for a long time. Yes, I worked as a full-time journalist for some leading Solomon Islands newspapers for five years. And after that, I resigned from my former job as a reporter in 2019, and came back to Malaita, where I live now and move into agriculture. 

The reason why I decided to move into agriculture is because during my career as a reporter, my field of reporting is mainly agriculture and climate change and during these times I was influenced. And I deiced to make my change my career from journalism to agriculture.

I remember that I finally came up with this decision after I visited Taiwan, where I was briefed on Taiwan starting its economic development program with agriculture, in 2017. So, I believe that agriculture is the only means for the Solomon Islands and Malaita to be developed from where we are at the moment. 

I really believe in agriculture and what really changes me and motivates me to leave my career from a journalist to agriculture.


Dave (Host): Oh, I see. So previously as a journalist you reported a lot on issues related to climate change and agriculture, and that’s what motivates you and convince you that agriculture is a meaningful sector in the Solomon Islands to boost the economy while counter some of the effects brought about by the climate change.


Lesley (Guest): Absolutely. That’s right. So that’s the basic reason why I moved from journalism to farming right now.


Dave (Host): Is there anything captivating about the geographical location where you are working in? Is there anything special Malaita?


Lesley (Guest): There are a lot of special things in Malaita. Malaita is not far from Honiara, our country’s capital. What is really special about Malaita is that we as Malaita people, agriculture is not a new thing; we are born and live in agriculture. So, I believe it’s a sign that we can move beyond the fact that people before mainly survive from farming organically and something like that. 

It’s a sign we can move further from making small harvests to commercialize them so that we can earn the money from the farming for living. We are good at working as farmers. We are good at that!


Dave (Host): Yes, I see that Malaita and the Solomon Islands as a country has a proud tradition of agriculture. You want to carry it forward and make it more commercialized.


Lesley (Guest): Yes, just to give some more information. During the blackbirding, there were more than 9000 people from Malaita and the blackbird took them to work in Fiji and neighboring countries to work in sugar cane plantations and other things – farming there. We from Malaita are good at farming. It’s time we can capitalize that and improve our yield to build our economy starting from agriculture.


Dave (Host): What is your most recent project in your farming school?


Lesley (Guest): OK thank you so much. So, at the moment, CCC Insight came back from Honiara in 2019 and started SWC and working with youths, women, and people in the community to move further in farming. We planted this cash crop and we call it kava, a highly demanded crop. People can… We have some commercial corps like taro, cocoa, and copra. 

During my time with the community, we introduced taro farming. At the moment as we speak, we have just released our farming school since 2000 (2019) and until now, we are yet to complete the classrooms and other infrastructure. But wehave established a school and we decided to come up with the idea to do taro bulking. 

Taro bulking is something we took different taro species from around our region, Kora region around central Malaita, and planted them at one place. The idea of it is very important as things begin to change, as it continues to invade our places, we have seen most of our important taro species extinct already. 

The idea here is to take the old taro species and put them at one place. We hope that our future generations, from now and onwards, people will see the origin of taros. If I could further explain, the idea to bulk them is to calling their names because now the generation, they do not understand the original names of the taros. When we bulk them, we have to document them: their original names (like our native names) and how long it takes for taros from planting to harvest. 

We really want to do it more organized than before when people plant taros mainly for consumption. We really want it to be done more organized. Our future generations learn from that but at the moment, we don’t have such things in our country, like more organized farming and all those things.


Dave (Host): A lot of work that is done by your farming school is also about passing the torch, the knowledge, and the knowhow about farming to the next generation. I assume that many of the members are also young people.


Lesley (Guest): Rightly said. For most of my group working at the farm comprises of young people and women as well. In our tradition, women are more important when it comes to farming. For men, we plant the whole things and women are always there to help men to implement the ideas. So those are the things that I moment we have for youth. Most of our group are young people and women as well.


Dave (Host): I’m curious about what are your strategies for attracting young people to farm? And how does social media actually play a role in that process?


Lesley (Guest): Actually, it was a long process to get the young people involved in such things. The first thing we do is to educate our young people and common people about the importance of farming, especially commercial farming, and about doing the bulking. 

We have to explain the importance of bulking the taros and other things, the importance of those knowledges and other things. Again, we started with raisingawareness and the community agreed, then we started implementing the idea. That’s how we started.


Dave (Host): OK interesting. Can you tell me maybe one or two interesting story or challenge you encountered when you’re trying to recruit young people to farm?


Lesley (Host): We didn’t have lot of challenges, but I can tell you one major challenge in terms of farming: we don’t really have professional knowledge. 

I came from a journalist background, but we have someone who worked in the field of organic farming for more than 20 years at home. I supported him and we have to come up with ideas. He’s there to mainly do organic farming and all those things. From my background, I supported him. We started to influence the young people. 

As we know, young people these days have a lot of things, influences, or activities, and other things to influence them. But again, with the creativity we have to come in and start to influence them, and like, I said, and it was quite challenging because I started with nothing with something like money. We don’t have money but we just sacrificed. 

The most important thing here is that we educate them to know the importance of the idea. Why is there that idea? How important is it and how will it benefit them? Those are the areas we cover in talks and we started to influence them to work. It’s quite challenging. We don’t have money to start with. We don’t buy them to work in a farm. We’re using talks and share ideas to let them come in and join us.


Dave (Host): I see. Thank you. I think your efforts and your sacrifices will not be in vain, and this will have a really profound influence on future generations. 

And now let’s speak more about working with the government and the public sector as a micro entrepreneur in Solomon Islands. I read a lot in news stories and studies, and also from the story you just told me that for a microentrepreneurs and developing country to start, it’s usually quite difficult without enough capital and needing to know more about the environment in general.

So, a big part of running a business is to work with the government, whether that is getting the financial support or to cope with the regulations. 

My first question: how would you describe your relationship with the government and the public sector?


Lesley (Guest): That is a very important question. Like I said, in terms of government support and my relations with the government, at the moment it’s not 100% that we can get government support. If I can tell you the truth, what I am doing is that sacrificing ourselves to do it.

The government is (not) here to assist us at the moment because of a lot of things, maybe because I don’t seek assistance from themor those things. At the moment, the government is afraid of our activities. We have yet to receive any support from them to support our activities. We want to keep working. The idea is that we want to provide self-reliance for our communities. We want something done before the government steps in.

Maybe in the future, we can ask the government to step in. But at the moment, the government is not yet stepping in to support us. We just started with nothing, with our bare hands at the moment, just to tell you the truth. But the government is always saying agriculture is the backbone of our country, but we are yet to see that becoming the reality in our case at the moment.


Dave (Host): I see. And you mentioned about the Government actually has some concerns about what you and your business is doing in a moment?


Lesley (Guest): Yeah, I don’t know. Maybe the government…yes, actually the governmentmaybe have concerns for different crops, or something like that. I don’t know, but yeah. But at the moment, like I said, we don’t receive any support from the government or even seek whatever from the government We just go on with our own. We just believe we can achieve it. 

What I said is that we want to start it first before the government…as long as we came up with whatsoever and maybe it can support us later. But I don’t know there’s just something like that, I’m just saying. But at the moment we do it ourselves without any support from the government, a donor, or whoever. We just go ahead with what we can do at the moment.


Dave (Host): I see. Now I think we can move to our next topic, which you have also mentioned before, and that is climate change. 

Climate change is now a global phenomenon, and I believe that despite the fact that now I’m living in London in the northern hemisphere, and Lesley is living in Solomon Islands, in the southern hemisphere. We can all feel some unusual changes in the weather over these years. And I think that, especially from the point of view of a of a farmer whose main source of income is significantly reliant on good weather. 

What would you say that which group of farmers – to be more specific – is most vulnerable to climate change?


Lesley (Guest): Yeah, as we know climate change is a global issue at the moment. But from where I am now, we can also feel the impact and the effects of climate change. Especially in terms of sea-level rise, mainly for the coastal people.

But for us those who live in the highlands of Malaita, we also feel the impacts of it. I’ll give you one example, like for us farmers, one thing that really affects us at the moment is the changes of our weather. The weather changes. 

Like for the case of Solomon Islands, we have our rainy season. It started from November to April. The dry season is from May to October or something like that. But at the moment, that is not really right. Most of the time for us people live in highlands, we experience a lot of our rain than dry season. So, for us farmers, for this case we have (been) affected a lot because we have more rain than dry season.

So, you know, because the method we use for gardening is slash and burn. Slash and burn will work only during a dry season. But since that we have more rain than dry season, the method of gardening is not really working at the moment. So, this is why we have to come up with some adaptation methods and we have to research our own methods and we came up with.

So, this is the reason why we have to come up with this school, and, like the school that I mentioned already, those methods will be taught as soon as we start the school. So, the methods we are teaching at the school is the climate change adaptation methods. At least we can teach our farmers so that they can farm and feed their family, and earn money from farming as well. I’ll give you one example of our methods at the moment. 

For example, slash and burn is the normal one or the common one everyone is using in highlands. But since people suffer from rain and change of weather, we shift from “slash and burn” to “slash and plant”. Slash and plant is our own method: you don’t have to burn them, you just have to brass, clean the area, and then you plant. No, there is no need for to burn like “slash and burn” or to burn your rubbishes. You just brass and clean that area and you plant.

But that is one of the methods that we came up with, and it’s really working well for us at the moment, because, you know, like I said earlier on, for us it is quite different from those who live in the coastal area that they experience a lot of sun or dry season than heavy rain or rainy season compared to us. Because we live in the mountains, there are a lot of trees, and so they attract rain and sun.


Dave (Host): Thank you! And I’d also like to ask you so. What are some of your recommendations for policymakers to provide accommodation for those most impacted by the climate change?


Lesley (Guest): Yes, just to be true and to tell you the truth. A lot of the decisions made at the highest levels with the decision makers, well, some of decisions made were just assumptions because the reality is still on the ground. And since we experienced this climate change and effects of climate change, no one is coming to us to ask about our own measures and to ask about how we can deal with them. They just maybe came up with their own and talked about “out there…”, but the reality is on the ground. 

So, what I suggest is decision makers should come to us, ask us, “how do you deal with these effects of climate change?”, “how do you make your gardening seeing that you have a lot of rain here?”. I mean those are the questions they should come and ask us so that we can show them.

It’s really good if the decision makers can listen to us, so we can show them what methods we use and the things that we use so that we can help address this kind of a situation that is affecting our people and our lives at the moment, specifically farmers.


Dave (Host): So, governments in the world should play a bigger role in providing accommodation for those most impacted by climate change, and it is really important for them to actually come to the field as to see from the grassroots perspective so that they can get an idea of what is really happening.


Lesley (Guest): Yes, that’s correct. You are correct. So, what I am saying is climate change is not a loving mother at the moment. It also affects us farmers or the rural people. We are the people that are really affected by the climate seeds like for us.

We have our own methods, for, you know, dealing with this climate change. Some of the methods we used is quite different because it is something connected with our beliefs – how we can stop the rain and those are from our traditional knowledges. So those are the important things that we use for us. I can still remember some of our grandfathers when I was a little kid. 

We experienced a lot of rain, and we asked our grandfather, who is still holding sacrifices to our ancestors to stop the rain because we wanted to make garden. So, he did that. I have seen with my naked eyes, and is so like I said, it is not ordinary thing; it is quite different. It’s something related to our beliefs. So, it’s quite different from the beliefs of maybe whoever. But this is what he did. I have seen them with my naked eyes. And I’ve tested that. I have passed that. 

So, like I said, it’s quite important that the authorities must not neglect us. They should come, and see us,ask us what we need to help and find ways to address this.


Dave (Host): This is really interesting. Indeed, the government should work more closely with the grassroots, the farmers in the field to tackle their problems.


Lesley (Guest): Yeah. That’s right. Just one more thing I would like to mention here. In terms of climate change, we have seen a lot of conferences, like COP27 – whatsoever, you name it – taking place over there. Our government…local government receives a lot of money from donors supporting us to deal with this climate change. But at the moment, we have yet to see the fruit of that. 

What’s the reason for those COP27 and those conferences? That’s a question I would like to post for the leadership and the big people to ask themselves…because of course we have a lot of conferences, but until now there is no great impact on that. 

Maybe I don’t know what’s the reason, but what it is important here is the big people and leaders should come down to our rural people and ask us how we can work together, collaborate to deal with this issue because it (climate change) is not a loving mother at the moment. It affects us, affects our lives, and maybe in the future if we continue to live careless about this, the impact of climate change in the future will be more than what we have been experiencing now.


Dave (Host): Yes, indeed. For our next topic I would like to move on to another topic that is also equally important as climate change, and that is the role of women in agriculture and development. And you mentioned before that women play a very important role in farming, and I would like you to elaborate more on that. And how is the role of women different to that of men?


Lesley (Guest): Coming back to the roles women were playing in agriculture and farming, our cultural context is quite different from what people may say about us. In our context, women are always the powerful people in farming.

Women are important because they play an important role for supporting men with ideas on farming. For us, men can talk about ideas but women are implementers. For example – I will give you an example – men can say, “there’s a good place to farm”. The next thing women can go with their men and start the garden and cleaning the area. Women play an equal role in farming. 

In some of the cases like I mentioned earlier on, for some native names of taros, we have lost them already. At the moment,women, some of the women – maybe few – still got the knowledge because they are into the garden more than us men. For men, like I said, we can plant, but women are implementors of those things. Indeed, women are important in farming because they do most of the jobs in the farming.


Dave (Host): In terms of the labor of agriculture, so it’s not just about the strength and using the tools, but it is also a lot about the know-how about how to perform the right kind of methodology in farming, and in planting.


Lesley (Guest): Correct. You are right. Like I said, some of our knowledge about our traditional ways of farming, some women know that more than men because women are more into the garden and into the farm than men as well.


Dave (Host): Maybe can you tell me if there is a crop – when you are planting a crop – that is impossible to do so without the participation of women?


Lesley (Guest): OK, good. Traditionally, there are some plants… but in our case, our traditional, aboriginal plant is taro. Some of the taros are male and some of taros are female. Some of the taros are mainly for men and some of the taros are mainly for women. There are others that men and women can eat. And there are others that only women can plant. I am yet to give you the truth on this because I am yet to complete my research on that.

Currently I am doing a research on taro and that question is in that research. If I completed it, I will give you, but basically that is a fairly important question because some taros are mainly for men, some are mainly for women, and some are just general for men and women.


Dave (Host): I think it is. It’s quite fascinating that there’s different gender participation to the planting of a specific crop.


Lesley (Guest): Yes.


Dave (Host): I think we will wrap it up for our broadcast for today. Thank you, Leslie, for having this intellectually stimulating conversation with me. Thank you very much.


Lesley (Guest): Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for these wonderful privileges to come about and talk about what we are doing at the rural areas at the moment. Thank you so much for capturing the stories at the rural area. Thank you so much!


Dave (Host): Yeah, Thank you as well. And good luck to your agriculture business. Andthank you for listening. Thank you.

After speaking to Lesley via phone, we also chatted over text the other day and I learnt in this conversation that Lesley is also very active on social media and especially Facebook.

On Facebook, he has set up Malaita News to advocate for the rural people and has a lot of covering of interesting stories about people in Malaita. He said that he often sees the voice of rural people never being heard and through a platform like Malaita news, people can see what they have accomplished and know these activities.

Please do check out Malaita News on Facebook if you are interested.

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