a place called Wingwi

The view from the plane was compelling. Orderly lines of seaweed cultivars sprawl across hectares on the reef of Wingwi, right where the channel forks like a trident in the isthmus northeast of Pemba.



aerial view of the forked channel of Wingwi, Pemba, Zanzibar, Tanzania


dense seaweed farms fill the tidal flat of Wingwi


Just like Maziwa Ngombe, the road to Wingwi is exceedingly rough. How the seaweed gets trucked out of the village is clearly challenging but infrastructure in the outskirts of Pemba is poor.


a woman farmer watching us curiously as we passed by



arches of trees overrun by vine create a surreal background amidst the ricefield


Most of the seaweed farmers actually live in the village that are some distance away from the channel. It is normal fare for them to walk a few kilometers to get to their farm sites during the day but they still curiously choose to live away from the water banks.


a boy carrying the seaweed that he was able to dry for the day



a shelter for respite near the drying area of Wingwi



seaweed drying tables are fashioned from cultivated pine

Seaweed mariculture is a fairly recent enterprise. It was introduced in Pemba in large scale in the early 90s but it is only in the last 2 or 3 years that the industry saw a significant spurt in production. Conveniences like styropor-bottom boats, plastic floaters and bamboo rafts otherwise common in seaweed-growing countries like the Philippines and Indonesia are sorely missing in Pemba. Farmers generally don’t have capital nor do they have access to farm materials. In fact, to transport seaweed from farms to the drying areas, farmers still use traditional canoes called mtombwe that are dugout from century old mango trees.



these canoes cost about $500 each



a dock for mtombwe boats in Wingwi