Permagardens & Peanut Butter

Written by Britni Stupin, TWB Intern

For the past three months, I’ve been living and learning in Kenya as part of a study abroad program at St. Lawrence University. The last month of this program is spent completing an Independent Study anywhere of our choosing, and that’s how I ended up in Rwanda. I heard about The Women’s Bakery from a few past interns, and they always lit up when they shared about their experiences. TWB, I decided, was the right placement for my internship. 

Food insecurity and malnutrition are significant issues within Rwanda, and I spent internship working on two main projects that intertwined with these issues.

First, I researched and created an implementation plan for a permagarden that TWB would create at the Kagina and Ndera bakeries.

What is a permagarden?

In short, it is a sustainable approach to increasing food security by giving control over water use and nutrition within an individuals' own home. I spent a good deal of time researching the specifics of what a permagarden is, how to create one, and its benefits for women at TWB. Part of this research was meeting with women at both bakery sites to discuss the best way to complete this project. Each bakery now plans to plant carrots, beets, and cabbage next planting season.

The second, and tastiest, project, was aptly named “The Peanut Butter Project.” I worked with another intern, Martha, to create a nutritional lesson about the health benefits of peanut butter and how to make it in their homes.

The women at the Ndera and Kagina bakeries were engaged during the lesson and everyone pitched in to help. I’d say it was a success! All the peanut butter was gone almost as soon as we had made it, and the women told me they would be making this nutritious snack to eat for breakfast.

I walked away with a huge smile on my face that day.

If there is anything I have learned about my experience working at TWB it is that women’s empowerment and education can be used to combat food insecurity and malnutrition in the home. By helping women understand the impact food has on their body, TWB is giving women the knowledge they need to feed their families and nurture their health. That's bread power. 

Cooperative Women

A cooperative, in the traditional sense, is nothing other than people with common goals, with a certain amount of resources, coming together to form and develop a working synergy so those goals can be achieved.

Gathering together collectively in this manner is important to the work of The Women’s Bakery due to the fact that it is not easy to collaborate, grow, and develop in isolation or at the individual level.

At the bakery, women’s capabilities and powers are raised to grow and work together so credibility of our product and business is built.

Though, the cooperative model is something that our groups of women are used to – developing this into a business model takes time, but it’s happening. My internship was largely about marketing, however, I was able to continue to learn and experience the business model first-hand. 

With various capacities, specifically at the Remera Bakery, the women are creating competitive advantages to the working environment that allow for greater efficiency and stream-lined daily operations. These are workflows that groups of women are trained in, and then experience further development upon extending time within the bakery.

My time with TWB has been full of joy, learning, and encouragement with the TWB team and women within the bakery. There are a lot of challenges when it comes to introducing a new product to customers, which was the focus of my internship, but what is amazing is that all our women have faced it and remained persistent in any difficulty faced. I have learned about this kind of business acumen and how to work together cooperatively, and still in the business context.

This is in fact, cooperation, and real bread power.

Together we rise.