Getting enough food

In Kiribati, we have long periods of dry intense heat weather and droughts. This effects the soil quality, anyways we have very shallow sandy soil, and limits the kinds of crops we can grow here. Root crops are hard to grow like that, so we mainly grow things like watermelon and cucumber, also banana and breadfruit from trees, if they are not dying from the sea water coming up onto the land. Some of our islands far from the capital have to rely on imported food delivered by boat, but sometimes boats go there only a few times each year as its so far so they suffer more than people in the capital area. During times of food shortages, our moms are actually the ones that suffer most as they will feed the kids and elderly first, then the men, and only eat last if there is enough leftover.

one thing that helps us is the knowledge passed down from traditions about food preservation. we know that breadfruit and dry coconut can be stored for a really long time, and I've seen villagers making small ovens to dry food. instead of harvesting constantly from the trees, we can do more of what our ancestors did, like storing food in the soil.