It starts with a seed. This farmer near Grand Popo saved his onion seed from last year, and was about to plant it in between rows of tomatoes in a medium-scale commercial field…

… or this agroecological organic garden Les Jardins de l’Espoir saves and dries seed from different vegetables through the year for use in their small-scale organic commercial vegetable gardens.

Seed is technical and political as well as natural. My colleague Judith here is an okra breeder, she breeds improved varieties of okra that tolerate African climates and resist diseases across different local ecologies. Farmers can buy these seeds each year for better yields and tolerance of pests.

Improved seed tends to germinate more often than traditional seed… But these organic farmers in Cotonou see seed as their heritage, and say they would rather have seed sovereignty and control over their own seed, than higher yielding seed which they have to buy every year. Farmers have different perspectives about seed issues.

Some grow commercial organic agroecological gardens, mixing plants that bring beneficial bugs and ward off pests…

… and using hard labour to weed and compost, rather than use chemical sprays and fertilizers.

Other farmers try out methods like staking their tomatoes to keep them off the ground to reduce pest damages and diseases …

These are non-staked tomatoes, so many lay on the ground and are more susceptible to pests and diseases. So pesticide is used a lot, often more than recommended by manufacturers or extension services. So pesticide contamination (of food, and of workers) is a big problem. Some farmers say they have a separate garden where they grow food for their family without chemicals.

Some farmers may have access to irrigation…

But most farms here rely on the rainfall for water, and on poor and landless people for labour…

Weeding this carrot field is back-breaking work. A ten-hour day earns these workers around 4,000 FCFA, about 6.50 US dollars.

If the crop works, it needs to be harvested by hand. Pickers get around 400 FCFA per basket, about 0.65 US dollars. One picker can harvest 8-10 baskets in a day. In the holidays, parents might get their children to help, to bring in more baskets.

The baskets mount up by the side of the fields…

Then they need to be transported for sale. This could be on your head…

Or by motorbike…

Or in whatever this is…

Then the vegetables need to be sold. Here my colleague Aminata inspects the tomato crop as it waits by the side of the road to be picked up by traders. A large proportion of Benin’s vegetable crop is bought by Nigeria just next door, making money for middlemen and traders, but some feel this raises vegetable prices for consumers in Benin.

Many people in Benin buy their vegetables from small vendors, who buy from the major wet-markets and bring vegetables closer to people at a small markup…

Another option is supermarkets, which tend to come along with more packaging, and to be more expensive.

Beyond these traditional options, Benin now has some emerging organic farmers markets, bringing produce direct from farmers to consumers…

The aim of the farmers market is shorter value chains, meaning higher prices for farmers while making organic produce affordable for people, cutting out the middlemen (and saving on packaging and food miles, too)…

The ultimate aim is safety, quality and diversity: In the fields, and on the plate