Damaris Loie

Damaris Loie and her husband Tella have worked together for over 20 years making honey in the frontyard of their home in Logofate, in Ungai-Bena District.

The couple have customers for their delicious, 100% organic honey from around the Highlands, but aren’t keeping their specialised knowledge to themselves: they’re trying to train other women in the Eastern Highlands, so they can help ‘kamapim’ others. “They will be happy, and you will be happy too,” Damaris said.

Tella loves working with his wife, and says more PNG men could benefit from doing the same.”Working in partnership with women is very good,” he said. “We’re a team, and it makes our work much easier. Also, women are very good managers, especially in terms of finance.

“If PNG men have this mentality where they’re only thinking of themselves, it won’t work as well. But if we can team up and apply the wisdom of women – their management skills, their way of looking after their families and putting food on the table – if we can incorporate this attitude into our businesses, I think communities in PNG will be better off.”

Sesame John

Sesame John is a flower-gardener in Kabiufa, Goroka. Every week she sells flowers, fetching up to K200 per pot! She also sells large amounts for events and celebrations, and regularly hires out her gorgeous posies to Goroka University for graduation ceremonies. Her beautiful garden contains literally thousands of kina in flowers.

Having worked profitably in floriculture for more than 20 years, Sesame is a firm believer in reaping what you sow. “We have our land, so we must work,” she told us. “Moni stap long graun (‘money is inside our land’). If we work hard, we make money. If we are lazy, and wait for someone else, it will be hard for us to survive.

“You must work, you must sweat. And you will reap the rewards of your hard work.”