THE GAMBIA

THE GAMBIA - SMILING COAST OF AFRICA

Capital: Banjul

Area: 11.295 km2 

Languages: English and local languages: Wolof, Mandika, Fula

Currency: dalasi (D)

Population: ca. 1.730.000

Gambia is one of the smallest African country. On the West it borders on the Atlantic Ocean, on land, it is encircled by Senegal. It is 320 kilometres long and 20 to 30 kilometres wide. In 1651, it became an English colony, even though the entire Western Africa belonged to France. The borders were established by the English; they sailed inland by the Gambia River, and established the border with Senegal with the range of their canon grenades. Nowadays, this small country looks like a finger, poking into Senegal. 

Even though Gambia lays on the edge of Africa, its attractions do not fall behind. The capital, Banjul, sweeps away the tourist feel of the bigger cities with its street culture, giving a unique African experience. The city is situated where the Gambia River enters the Atlantic. It has about 35. 000 inhabitants and it is one of the smallest capitals in the world. It has been named Banjul in 1973. Because it sits on a peninsula, the English first named it St Mary's Island. Later, it got the name Bathurst, after a secretary of the British Colonial Office, Henry Bathurst.

Gambia is known for the most favourable climate in Western Africa. The weather is subtropical with rainy and dry seasons. The coastal areas are dry from mid-November until mid-May, and the rainy season lasts from June until October. Inland, the cool season is shorter and daily temperatures can rise to the extremes. Most days are sunny even during the rainy season.

Gambia is also one of the poorest African countries. The United Nations place Gambia on 168th place out of 182 countries with low income. Poverty is common, expansive and mostly provincial. More than 60% of country people live in poverty and in very bad living conditions. Factors such as ethnicity and the size of the village seem unimportant when it comes to poverty, as the situation is the same all over the country, but the countryside still remains the heart of poverty. These areas are populated by a third of all provincial population in Gambia.

More than 90% of extremely poor and 70% of poor people depend on farming.  Every year, people need to deal with the so called “hungry season”, which is at the peak of the rainy season, between July and September, when their food supplies are very low or exhausted. To cover their expenses, the poorer households depend on their crops, such as peanuts and other produce. Price decrease means less income to satisfy basic needs. The recent global crisis (financial crisis and increasing gas and food prices) cause big problems for poor countryside households. The crisis affected the country’s economy and pushed even more people into extreme poverty. Prices change with the crisis, and the price of rice, for example, has increased by 50%, which makes it difficult for many households to keep up with their normal consumption of food, from view of both quantity and quality.

The poorest population in Gambia are the farmers in hilly landscapes, where a minimal income is being made by growing peanuts. At least a half of the poor are farmers and other agricultural workers. In comparison with men, women are even more threatened by poverty than men. The connection between gender and poverty is known as “feminization of poverty”. The production of rice or rather, the cultivation of rice fields is mostly the work of women. Productivity is low due to the simple technology and practices that they use. Almost 88% of women are also included in gardening activities (producing vegetables and fruit), and most women also take care of cattle, to ensure the supply of food for the household.  In most cases, the women are not owners or supervisors of the land, but they still carry disproportionate amounts of work load. Most often, they do not have access to loans for profitable projects and have a limited role in making decisions, which would affect their lives. Poverty in Gambia has its roots in declining economic rates and uneven distribution of income. It is the consequence of lack of natural resources and dependency on producing earthnuts as their main source of income.

Primary reasons for poverty in Gambia’s countryside include:

·         Low soil fertility.

·         Low agricultural productivity.

·         Inadequate access to water and soil.

·         Insufficient import/export policy.

·         Low prices for peanuts and some types of rice on the world markets.

·         Ineffective provincial institutions, which lack basic social services, banking establishments...

·         Rain, which is the culprit for up to 40% loss of harvest.

·         Poor farmers grow crops for their own consumption and sell the excess at extremely low prices.

·         They are trapped in a circle of fear from taking a risk, limited supplies, low productivity and low income.