Background – Even before 2004, Nias island ranked among the poorest regions of Indonesia. More than 30 per cent of the population was living below the poverty line. The 2004 Tsunami and the 2005 earthquake made their plight even more precarious. It was the coastal regions and the urban populations that benefitted from the lion’s share of the global assistance. The mountainous hinterland which was greatly affected by the earthquake was largely neglected. The inhabitants of the remote island are farmers and mainly live on rubber, cocoa and coconut. Cocoa is replacing rubber as the main source of income, but it is not yet cultivated in a systematic and comprehensive manner: productivity is low and incomes are insufficient. Poverty is widespread, especially in the South of the island and many children below five years suffer from malnutrition.

Project – Swisscontact has started a project in the mountainous hinterland of Gomo in the South of Nias that empowers the villagers to improve their income, diversify their nutrition and work together in order to develop their community. Especially women learn how to grow new sorts of vegetables in home gardens and are sensitized about the importance of balanced diet, particularly for their children. Surplus vegetables can be sold on the weekly local market and thus are an additional source of income for the families. Local cocoa farmers are being trained to become trainers themselves. They then teach their neighbours proper cocoa cultivation techniques as well as post harvest handing, allowing them to increase their harvest and raise quality of their produce. Swisscontact is facilitating the producers’ access to market and pricing information. This reduces their dependence on local buyers, who often exploit the fact that the farmers do not actually know the market prices of their own goods. Coached by Swisscontact, the communities draw up development plans, identifying and ranking the priorities of basic infrastructure projects that they want to realize under their own initiative. By the end of 2011, the project in Nias will have enabled 1,200 households (around 9,500 people) to increase their income by 50 percent and overcome poverty.