From cow manure to quilts
Saving time and trees with a biodigester gives time for making quilts
The colourful, hand-sewn, pieced quilt that Addlight Mudombo unfolds in her Zimbabwe workroom would probably never have been made if she and her husband didn’t have cow manure and a biodigester.
Addlight Mudombo shows a quilt she has hand-sewn from used clothing. Her husband, Elnathan Mboweni, not pictured, designed the quilt top. MCC photo/Meghan Mast
The explanation of this odd connection starts with firewood.
Mudombo used to spend many hours each week collecting wood that she needed to cook her family’s dinner over an open fire. Dead wood is increasingly hard to find because of deforestation, so she and her friends walked long distances into remote and sometimes dangerous areas of the forest to find fuel.
“As women, we are vulnerable to many things, even animals,” Mudombo says. “I was afraid. I was supposed to go there (the forest), so my children can get food and whatever.” She has three school-age children.
But in 2022, Mennonite Central Committee’s partner Score Against Poverty (SCORE) helped Mudombo and her husband, Elnathan Mboweni, get an underground biodigester on their farm in Joseph Village. Now, every day, one of them mixes cow manure with water and pours the mixture into the digester, which turns the manure into gas energy.
Addlight Mudombo mixes cow manure with water before feeding it to a biodigester where it turns into odour-free gas, which powers her gas stove in the kitchen. MCC photo/Meghan Mast
That gas powers a hotplate in Mudombo’s kitchen, where she can cook her family’s meals of beans and sadza (finely ground cornmeal) without constantly breathing in smoke, which has affected her health. Even her husband cooks now, defying the cultural stereotype that cooking is only women’s work. In the future, she hopes to buy a gas-powered freezer to preserve food to sell.
“Now, it’s like I am safe,” she says. “I feel like I am protected and can cook anytime when I need to.”
As a recipient of SCORE's biodigester, Addlight Mudombo can cook quickly and efficiently on her gas stove instead of spending time searching for firewood to make a traditional cookfire. MCC photo/Mehgan Mast
And she has more time and energy to invest in other income-generating projects, including sewing quilts to sell.
Mboweni works with her on the project by figuring out the size of the quilt and creating the overall design. He makes the templates for the fabric pieces, which they cut from used, colourful clothing. She stitches fabric triangles, squares and diamonds together in the evening.
“It takes a long time because I don’t use a machine. I’m just using my own hands, putting these things together to make a meaningful thing,” Mudombo says.She learned to piece quilts from her sister, and Mboweni consults the internet to get ideas for designs.
Addlight Mudombo and her husband, Elnathan Mboweni, show two quilts that they have made. MCC photo/Meghan Mast
Although most of Mudombo’s day now is spent working in the field and managing employees on her brother-in-law’s truck farm, Mudombo also helps other women learn to sew quilts. She uses the opportunity to encourage them to protect the environment by planting trees and acquiring energy-efficient technology, things she’s learned through participation in SCORE’s Women’s Coalition for Climate Change.
All farmers in the community are dealing with climate change, which has shortened and interrupted the rainy season, raised temperatures and reduced the amount of food people can grow. Mudombo and Mboweni demonstrate the biodigester to their neighbours as one way to reduce deforestation, which contributes to climate change.
Addlight Mudombo and her husband, Elnathan Mboweni, stand among tomatoes that have been fed with organic fertilizer, a byproduct of the manure from biodigesters. MCC photo/Meghan Mast
By participating in SCORE’s community savings and loan groups, the neighbours can purchase biodigesters, solar power or an energy-efficient stove, all of which protect the environment and create opportunities for new income, says Tariro Cynthia Mutsindikwa, SCORE’s clean energy engineer.
Mboweni says he also appreciates the time that the biodigester has brought into their lives. Before they had it, every day for him meant working long hours in the field and coming back to the house to eat and sleep so he can work again the next day. Now, with his wife’s help on the farm, they can come home in time to cook and eat with the family and still enjoy making quilts for a little extra cash.