60 | SMALLHOLDER DIARIES Œo understand their overall priorities in responding to ris, participants in the Smallholder ‰iaries were ased to ran their three most important agricultural ris mitigation strategies­ ˆmong the –o—ambiue sample, buying or leasing machinery (“… percent) and using fertili—er (Ÿž percent) were named the two most important strategies­ €nterestingly, though they were deemed important, virtually no one in the sample used either approach, which could suggest that they were already convinced about their efficacy but laced the financial tools to deploy these strategies­ CASE 4 DIVERSIFYING CROPS, DIET, AND INCOME, BUT CONSTRAINED FROM DOING MORE: THE NAMUACAS (MOZAMBIQUE) ˆs part of the Smallholder ‰iaries sample in –o—am- œven among this extensive variety of crops, none of biue, the ˜amuacas live with their three daughters the …‘ could be harvested during the hunger season in and two sons on a very small plot of land (’­…’ hectare)­ ‰ecember and Žanuary­ ™hen food stores ran low, the ˆlberto, ”’, and Œeresa, “’, both started studying but ˜amuacas were tempted to harvest and eat crops, par- did not complete primary school­ Œhey considered ticularly cassava, from the field before they were ripe­ educating their children a priority and ensured that ¦ther families in the Smallholder ‰iaries sample in their school-age children remained in school­ –o—ambiue considered this, too, but eating unripe ™oring with three small parcels of land, ˆlberto cassava can be dangerous­ €t contains a substance that, and Œeresa grew …‘ crops peanuts, sweet potatoes, rice, when consumed, can trigger the production of cyanide cassava, mai—e, beans, sugar cane, bananas, papaya, and be poisonous­ €n addition, families also made a orange, tomatoes, and mangoes­ Œhe ˜amuacas con- trade-off between planting bitter and sweet varieties sumed most of their agricultural production (see igure of cassava­ Œhe bitter variety contains more cyanide Ÿ…), and sold only four of their crops bananas, mangoes, when unripe and should not be harvested early, yet it is tomatoes, and rice­ Œhey did consume some of these more resistant to pests sweet cassava is less dangerous four crops, but they were grown primarily for sale­ Œhe and allows food to stretch across more months of the most important harvests for the ˜amuacas were cassava year, but it is more susceptible to pests­ Œhe ˜amuacas in ˆugust, peanuts in –ay, rice in Žune, and bananas in valued the resistance to pests and chose to plant the ˆugust¤September and ebruary (see igure Ÿ‘)­ bitter cassava, which taes more time to mature­ ƒie other smallholder families in the –o—ambiue sample, the ˜amuacas felt FIGURE 31: In-kind consumption: The Namuacas (MOZAMBIQUE) (KG) that it was important to eat different things Cassava 98 over the year­ Œhey euated good nutrition Peanuts 67 with consuming a diversity of foods, which Maize 66 motivated their extensive crop diversifica- Sweet Potato 47 Rice 40 tion­ “™e eat well,” ˆlberto explained, Beans 38 “ˆnd € than ‡od that € harvest enough Orange 20 food to feed my children­ € thin my family Banana 20 has good nutrition because we manage to Papaya 15 eat fish, cassava flour, sorghum, rice, and € Tomato 13 Sugar Cane 10 also have fruit trees­ Œhese are foods that Mango 0 neighboring households can’t always get­” 020406080 100