Awra Amba RJ 300612 EN - Contacter un comité local d'Attac
Awra Amba RJ 300612 EN - Contacter un comité local d'Attac
Awra Amba RJ 300612 EN - Contacter un comité local d'Attac
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4. Social organisation<br />
Yassin (2008/108) shows furthermore the evolution of the incomes distributed to all cooperative<br />
members from 2001 to 2007, but coming only from weaving and milling: see Figure 9. In 2007, the<br />
traditional weaving corresponded to aro<strong>un</strong>d 67 % of the whole activity of the cooperative, the<br />
modern weaving to aro<strong>un</strong>d 28 %, and the milling to aro<strong>un</strong>d 5 %. The weaving activity only started<br />
really in 2006.<br />
Finally, the members of the <strong>Awra</strong> <strong>Amba</strong> comm<strong>un</strong>ity assure their food needs are fully covered all<br />
along the year, whereas two thirds of the Amhara peasants cover their food needs only for nine<br />
months a year, 2.5 million people being affected by chronic food insecurity, and 3 million are h<strong>un</strong>gry<br />
almost every year (among 19 million inhabitants) (Ya08/96 and 101).<br />
The comm<strong>un</strong>ity remains nevertheless poor. Some yo<strong>un</strong>g members have left it, without doubt for<br />
economic reasons (At05/84).<br />
4.3. Equality between men and women at work<br />
As stated by At05/2, all societies practice at least some division of work between men and women.<br />
Williams (1993) states that women or men who do not comply with this division of work are<br />
suspected not to be "real women" or "real men". The movie of Stine (2012/52-54') gives for instance<br />
an illustration of that in the lower Omo Valley in southeast Ethiopia.<br />
In Ethiopia, women work more than men: the women work in average more than 13 hours a day, but<br />
the men less than 13 hours a day (Habtamu et al., 2004/47 and 57).<br />
In <strong>Awra</strong> <strong>Amba</strong>, woman's inferior position in the economy was abolished by destroying the traditional<br />
division of work based on sex (At05/81). Women contribute to the expenditure of their household on<br />
an equal footing with men, and fulfil their own economic needs without depending on their husband;<br />
they have full control over their income (At05/83; Ya08/105). A woman of 40 years said (At05/81):<br />
"I participate in the economic activities of the comm<strong>un</strong>ity on the same level as my husband. I share<br />
equally as my husband. We both equally support our family without depending on one another."<br />
Picture 11: Female and male<br />
water carriers back<br />
from spring, in 2010.<br />
Of course, women are not battered for mistakes in their work (At05/80). Here women rights are<br />
respected, whereas in the rest of this poor co<strong>un</strong>try, traditions and traditional practices are followed,<br />
not the law. Melkenesh Seid, one of the women living in <strong>Awra</strong> <strong>Amba</strong> is happy with this situation.<br />
She said: "Being a member of <strong>Awra</strong> <strong>Amba</strong> means I am respected within the family and treated as an<br />
equal. I am able to claim my rights and if I am no longer happy in my marriage, I know than if I<br />
divorce, I get 50 % of our property." (France 24, 2009)<br />
This gender equality is general and starts at the yo<strong>un</strong>gest age. We have seen there are no genderbased<br />
games (Yi07/60); at school, the <strong>Awra</strong> <strong>Amba</strong> male students prepare tea and so show to other<br />
students this kind of work is not restricted to females (Yi07/79).<br />
However, is the equality real?<br />
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