Women of the tides – Seaweed farming on Zanzibar

Since the late 1980s, women on the east coast of Zanzibar have farmed red algae, known locally as seaweed. At low tide they tie seedlings to lines between wooden stakes, harvest after a few weeks and dry the crop in the village. Around four in five seaweed farmers are women, and for many it is their first income of their own. After tourism and cloves, seaweed is considered the island's third largest source of foreign income. The algae are mainly processed into carrageenan, a thickener used in food and cosmetics. Farming needs neither fertiliser nor feed, yet rising water temperatures increasingly cause plants in the shallow lagoon to die off. The calendar follows the women of Jambiani through their working day between lagoon and village.