When Catherine Mwanamwambwa first tried to grow roses for export, she was told that a woman couldn't handle such a business—and that roses wouldn't grow in her local climate anyway.
Twelve years later, Mrs. Mwanamwambwa can look out over the rich African soil of her 17-acre farm near Lusaka, Zambia, and bask in the sight of vast fields of roses stretching toward the warmth of the sun.
Mwanamwambwa's work as a businesswoman and farmer has taken her beyond the traditional African role of woman as childbearer and wife. And it has helped her chip away at gender discrimination. She now employs 120 people and fills Amsterdam's flower markets with her fragrant blossoms. She has also encouraged more than 4,000 small-scale farmers over the years—many of them women who own the land on which they live—to grow paprika, which she exports for them.
