Leaving footprints in a man's world of agriculture

I btissem Mahtout and Amira Messous pick fresh strawberries and tomatoes on the eco-friendly smallholding the two women are working near Algiers, a pioneering initiative in Algeria's male-dominated agricultural sector.

After graduating from university four years ago, they left the capital and started working on the small patch of land in Douaouda, some 30 kilometres to the west.

"As soon as I'm in the field I'm happy," said Messous, 28, holding a bundle of fresh beetroot.

"From morning to night, we're here.

"To me, it's the most beautiful job in the world."

The plant ecology and biodiversity graduates now run one of the country's rare ecological plots of land, where the produce is grown in harmony with the broader ecosystem and without using pesticides.

Messous said it was challenging at first to "have to integrate" into a sector in which most people who work the land are men.