Going back hundreds of years, along this coastline, people have collected oysters from the tentacles of the mangroves, which flank River Gambia…the tributaries are great sites for the oysters to grow. Oyster harvesting is traditionally a female-driven process – from collection, preparation, to selling of the oysters… hear more from Jason Florio as he talks to Neal James of Photography Daily Show/Photowalk approximately 00:28.50 mins in
One of the first portraits I shot in The Gambia, 20+ years ago, with my Deardorff film camera, was of a group of oyster ladies – Jason Florio – ‘Makasutu’ series
The way it (oyster harvesting) is done now, the women are a lot more conscientious about the environment. Before they would come and hack the branches off (when collecting the oysters). Thanks to the TRY Oyster Collective, working with the UN in The Gambia, who have been teaching them the importance of the mangroves in the eco-system to not only be conscientious about how the oysters are harvested, but also to see themselves as guardians of the mangroves. Thus preserving the eco-system – Jason Florio/Photography Daily Show
Photography Daily Assignment:Jason Florio #1 – Seeing double this week, well sort of. Jason Florio, photojournalist and African picture correspondent sets you a challenge for the next seven days with his first assignment. It’s been wonderful to see the pictures you have been making from the assignments set so far, so please keep sending your photographs for inclusion on today’s show page. Also I promote forward to my conversation on the 300th edition of the podcast this Friday with Jason on an assignment of a different nature and all-weather walker, bivvy-er, who records his adventures with photographs, Ronald Turnbull. Listen to the Podcast between Jason Florio and Photography Daily’s, Neale James
Stewards of the forest: the pioneering women’s collective harvesting the Gambia’s oysters – The Guardian
The all-female workforce is part of a visionary project committed to protecting the wetland forests. Now their challenge is to earn a sustainable living year-round.
“In the cool air of an April dawn, Marie Sambou, an oyster harvester, carves through the brown water of The Gambia River’s Tanbi wetland in her long wooden canoe. The size of Manhattan, Tanbi teems with life. The mangroves provide an important habitat for many birds and fish, which nest, breed and spawn in the protective, nutrient-rich environment. Snow-white egrets stalk schools of needle-like fish nipping through the shallows as curlews and hornbills whirl overhead, and higher still, vultures turn in lazy circles.
For the next six hours or so, while the tide remains low enough to work, Sambou will paddle along the forests on the riverbank, knocking hard, rock-like west African mangrove oysters (Crassostrea tulipa) from the exposed mangrove roots. It is tedious, physical work – and painful. Sambou has only thin gloves and socks for protection; her hands and feet are scarred from the razor-edged oyster shells”... words by JR Patterson – read more in The Guardian
Jason Florio, award-winning photojournalist and filmmaker, originally from London, based from NYC for 18 years before relocating to The Gambia, West Africa, in 2013. He has produced images and documentaries for clients including The New York Times, Smithsonian, The New Yorker, Men’s, Journal, Outside, Bloomberg, National Geographic, Geographical, MIT Technology Review, PepsiCo, Amnesty International and the World Bank. He is a contributing editor for the Virginia Quarterly Review.
