admin | May 1, 2023
Damtote Lamboni’s passion for radio goes back to her childhood. At a young age, she loved listening to the radio and watching TV and imitating the broadcasters she admired. Mrs. Lamboni took up public speaking in high school and started giving speeches on gender issues. She says that communicating has always been her passion.
Mrs. Lamboni has been a journalist and presenter for three years, and broadcasts programs on youth, gender, and agriculture at Radio Rurale Communautaire des Savanes in Togo. She is one of the winners of the 2023 George Atkins Communications Award. She says broadcasting is both her dream and her passion, and that she serves farmers each day with pleasure, joy, and love. She counts this passion as her greatest strength and dedicates herself to satisfying her listeners with rigour and seriousness.
Mrs. Lamboni says that her listeners face a serious lack of information, especially on organic production and composting. Instead, listeners default to chemical fertilizers, which are increasingly expensive or unavailable in Togo. Seeing this, Mrs. Lamboni made it her mission to help listeners learn about—and accept—organic practices.
She started broadcasting a program called Kpal n’yaal oukoa (That the farmers may flourish) in the languages most used by farmers. The program features exchanges between farmers and extension agents in order to help both men and women farmers improve their production. The focus is on soybean and groundnuts, key value chains in the region, and the role of women in agriculture. This program was a part of FRI’s RECOVER project, and used Uliza polls to boost interactivity.
She also produces a program called L’heure d’entrepreneuriat agricole (Agricultural entrepreneur hour). This program features businesses and entrepreneurs sharing their experiences in agriculture, including women’s agricultural coops. The program is often broadcast live on-site.
Mrs. Lamboni receives plenty of feedback on her programs, and much of it indicates that, thanks to her, listeners are improving their farming practices. She also offers two call-in lines for listeners. During the RECOVER project, she used the Uliza poll to gather real-time feedback from listeners and bring their voices on air.
To keep listeners’ interest and attention, Mrs. Lamboni’s program focuses on a variety of topics and features many different resource people. She also runs radio games and awards prizes for participation.
Mrs. Lamboni says that Farm Radio International supported her work through the RECOVER project both financially and technically, including in-station training. She thanks Farm Radio for teaching her to host agricultural programs, conduct interviews, do research on the internet, and use FRI’s radio resources as part of her programming.