MAPUTO, 1 February (IRIN) - Anastaneia Domingos, 28, and a mother of four, is a rarity among the women in the rural areas of northeastern Mozambique's Zambezia Province: she is a businesswoman.

Most women rely on their husband's income to put food on the table, or they produce meagre crops on small plots of land to help feed their families, but Domingos is one of a small group attempting to reverse the cultural tradition that resigns them to an impoverished existence, with their sole roles in the community usually those of mother and subsistence farmer.

Mozambique has reduced poverty levels dramatically since its 16-year civil war ended in 1992, but the progress has been uneven. According to the latest UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) report on Mozambique, 'Childhood poverty in Mozambique', "Female-headed households - which represent a third of all households in Mozambique - are poorer than families headed by men."

Poverty in the country's male-headed households declined by 18 percent from 1996/97 to 2002/03, but the gains for female-headed households over the same period were far less pronounced, with a poverty reduction of only four percent, the report said.

With the support of USAID and International Relief and Development (IRD), a nongovernmental organisation (NGO) providing targeted relief and development programmes to vulnerable groups, Domingos and a group of women from the small village of Raya, 115km north of Quelimane, capital of Zambezia, are establishing themselves as fledgling businesswomen in their local community.

The IRD Women's First programme (WFP) operates under a sub-grant from World Vision's OVATA Development Assistance Programme. In partnership with private sector companies, IRD establishes a sustainable product supply chain that provides a range of health, hygiene and other marketable products at discount prices to the women in rural areas. Each of the women's groups involved in the programme nominates one of their number as a stock keeper, who negotiates with the private-sector companies on their behalf for the delivery of goods and payments.

Setting up shop

The women place their orders and purchase the products from the stock keeper, who gets a 3 percent discount above that offered to the new door-to-door saleswomen. IRD's technical team also teaches them how to calculate their profit margins and carefully grow their businesses.

"We give a product kit to each woman - containing soaps, detergents and other hygiene products - that costs a discounted 500 meticais [about US$19]. Women sell door-to-door in their communities and, on a weekly basis, reinvest all of their profits into their business. As soon as a woman passes the limit of weekly sales of 800 meticais [about $30] she returns to the group the original 500 meticais [about $19] and she is given a bigger kit, worth 750 meticais [about $29]. The new weekly sales target is now 1,200 and the woman keeps on reinvesting her profits. Once she reaches this limit she goes on to a 1,000 kit, and she graduates from the programme when she reaches 2,000 of weekly sales," said programme coordinator Ilidio Matusse.

"When a woman successfully sells the first kit and moves on to the bigger one, we bring in a new participant to take her place. In this way we increase the number of women taking part, following the demand of the local market," she added.

Although Matusse said the task of adding entrepreneurial activities to people's livelihoods, as an option apart from subsistence farming, was difficult due to the traditional perceptions of women, but the programme had only been running for three months in Zambezia Province and appeared to be succeeding so far.

The WFP began in the southeastern Inhambane Province in July 2005, among established groups from the women's society of the United Methodist Church, with the support of the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA). Eighteen months later there are 15 groups of 20 women earning an income from selling their products to the local and extended communities.

"The biggest thing is to ensure the supply line between women living in extremely rural areas that are not easily accessible and the distributors remains intact. It is often difficult for the women to connect with the distributors because they have no transport, so we have to ensure the distributors come to a designated place the women can access easily enough," Matusse said.

More than just business

Even though the Zambezia project has only recently kicked off, the eight participants feel the programme has the potential to lighten the burden of poverty that grips their daily lives. "My husband does not work because he drinks alcohol all the time, so it is very good that I get this opportunity. I am excited; I am not yet feeling totally secure, but I feel more in control," said Domingos.

"I like being a businesswoman. Before I got this product the only thing I could do was work in the fields or sell beer made from coconuts. My husband has not said anything about my business yet, but he is very happy to see me bringing home the money. Some people in the community ask me: 'What are you doing? You should go and work in the fields'. They do not think women can do business properly, but they are just jealous - they will respect us more when they see the benefits."

The immediate benefit comes from greater economic security, but the programme also provides education about HIV/AIDS and each participant is obliged to take part in the HIV/AIDS education programme when they sign up.

By the end of 2006 the UN estimated that over 1.6 million Mozambicans were living with HIV/AIDS, 58 percent of whom were women and 5 percent were children under the age of five.

"People hear about HIV here these days but most still ignore it or don't take it seriously," Matusse said. "So we view both elements of our programme as equally important - we have four business monitors and three HIV trainers and they all work hand in hand."

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