After the Flood in Pakistan 38 Berlin Geographical Papers - Freie ...

These conditions require most households to access basic food supplies on credit terms
too, which in this case happens through caste networks. The headman of the village, Manzoor
Ali Solengi, is a retired army soldier and most affluent person in Zafarabad who also
runs a shop in the small market place Sita. Incidentally, all Solengi villagers receive food
on credit basis from his shop, which they return in kind from their share of harvest.
Zafarabad also is the home of four Mallah households. Before the flood, these were responsible
for maintaining a fish-pond close to the village area that is owned by the landlord
too. Here a sharefishing system is in place quite similar to that encountered by the field
team in Thatta. In Zafarabad, fisherfolk need to pay for all inputs needed for fish breeding
on dictated credit terms. All profit has to be shared on 50-50 basis with the landlord. Similar
to agricultural sharecroppers, the loss of investment of 40,000 Rs taken before the
flood to prepare the ponds for a new season have to be compensated for by the Mallah. To
cope with the situation of currently not being able to breed fish themselves, the members
of the Mallah households started working on much less profitable daily wage basis in fish
farms in surrounding villages. Here, they receive 100 Rs per 40 kg of fish. Working on their
own ponds, they earned three times the amount.
The amounts of credits needed for life-cycle events such as weddings or for health expenses
are mostly accessible only from landlords too, which further increases their dependencies.
Nearly 80% of the households in Zafarabad are bound into such credit arrangements, but
the situation intensified significantly after the flood. With the autumn harvest alreadygone,
many sharecropping households lost the spring harvest of 2011 too because many
fields are still flooded and not cultivable.
Source: photograph © Wibke Ott, February 25, 2011
Fig. 5.53: People on their way to a wedding in Zafarabad
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