We drive up the bumpy dirt path in our white Landrover, the large radio antennae bouncing back and forth, across the accumulated broken glass and cans that have been dumped here, past empty shells of broken cars. As we reach the top of the hill, Ressano García lies calm in the afternoon sun, surrounded by dark mountains. Across the mountain ridge lay South Africa - so close, and yet so far from Mozambique, the seventh poorest country of the world.

A young boy comes walking up the path towards us, with a heavy load of firewood gingerly balanced on his head. When he reaches the large red sign with the white skull, he turns onto the path to his right. With long, confident strides, he walks straight into the minefield! Speechless, I turn and look after him. In the distance, I see other people carrying other things on their heads, they are all walking on this same path.

Out of necessity, the people here have decided that they would rather walk through the minefield than take a long detour. They have to bring home their heavy loads, and many of them have already walked many miles when they reach this point. They are taking a real risk: so far, there have been eight landmine accidents in this area, killing five people and three animals. The Accelerated Demining Programme that operates in the southern provinces of Mozambique - including Maputo Province, where Ressano García and this particular minefield are located - has put up large warning signs along the edges of the minefield, and hopes to start demining soon so that people no longer have to rely on their good luck.

Mozambique ratified the Mine Ban Treaty in 1998. However, landmines left from almost thirty years of armed struggle (first the independence struggle against the Portuguese colonisers, and then the civil war between the Mozambican liberation army, FRELIMO, and the rebel forces, RENAMO) continue to make large areas of land inaccessible and life threatening. In a country whose people rely largely on agriculture and subsistence farming, these landmines have far-reaching economic effects in addition to the physical threat they pose. People are increasingly moving out of the capital Maputo, where job opportunities are rare, and into the countryside where they hope to cultivate their own small piece of land.

In Marracuene, people can hardly wait for the deminers to finish their work. All around the fenced-off minefield, you can see new houses sprouting up. Everybody wants to be the first to move back and get a stab at the fertile soil. During the flooding in 2000, this entire area was submerged in water, and now peanuts, cassava and maize grow amongst the new houses. The children who are munching on ripe mangoes or walking with their plastic canisters to fetch water from the lake seem to have gotten used to the white mine marking tape along the paths. They laugh and marvel at my camera, which they find much more interesting than the tape.

Adopt-A-Minefield®