NARSINGDI: She cannot believe she made it! Five years! That’s what it took for Sabina Akter to fulfill the pledge she made to herself for alleviation of poverty. Sabina still chokes as she recalls that day. “I had three children and I did not know what to do. But I swore I wouldn’t give up, I would stand on my feet.” True to her words, Sabina Akter of Hoglakandi village in Narsingdi Sadar, now has three lemon gardens from where she earns several lakhs of taka.
In the backyard two milky cows chew the cud. Sabina was worried about how she would increase her family income. In 2007, she enrolled herself as a member of Hoglakandi Paira Mohila Unnyan Samity, an micro-finance group for advancement of rural women, being run by local microfinance programme of Dhaka Ahsania Mission (DAM), says a press release.
She took a loan amounting to 10,000 taka from DAM for doing agricultural activities at the courtyard of her house. With the micro-finance loan and a lot of labour, Sabina was able to dramatically improve the production of seasonal crops and vegetables. She sometimes cultivated chilly, sometimes gourd and sometimes jute or potato. This way, she continued for 5-6 years. Although her family income increased but it was not that much significant. At this stage, an agri-official of DAM advised her to cultivate the crop which has commercial value. He also asked her to apply improved technology and take help from the local Department of Agriculture Extension. Being inspired by the success of other farmers who became solvent by cultivating lemon through application of improved technology, Sabina decided to conquer poverty through lemon farming on commercial scale. When asked for capital, local DAM official assured herself necessary support.
That made a world of difference to Sabina’s life. This is the beginning of her journey towards economic emancipation from poverty.
Since 2012, fortune favoured her. She thought for extending her garden. She dreamt of earning lemon worth 3-4 lakhs within a period of three months. Excluding all expenses, she will get a net profit of two-and-a-half taka. But this time she won’t buy lemon saplings from others, rather she prepared her own bed of lemon saplings. She extended her garden. This time, she owns three gardens wherethere are more than 200 trees. She herself took care of those. Sometimes, her husband and children extended their helping hands. This year, she targeted to sell 1,000 saplings, from where she expects to get more 50,000 taka as additional income.
“When the first lemons grew, I could not believe my eyes,” Sabina recalls. “The fruits of my labour. My only lifeline to survival.” The lemons were reaped. Her husband sold them at the market. Ultimately, she earned a good profit.
