Angeline Nyabieli cooks at home on her grass island in Paguir village. Four consecutive years of heavy rains and flooding have left about two-thirds of South Sudan under water. ‘If the floods increase I will stop my children going to school because there will be no funds,’ she says

Nyachuana Lok dismantles her damaged home in the village to reuse the materials on drier land. The floods have wiped out acres of farmland across Fangak county, leaving people struggling for food

Biel Koryom in his hut perched on a tiny manmade island. His wife and children are sick. ‘It is five days now since they have been in hospital,’ he says. The UN has warned that more than 7.7 million people in South Sudan will face severe food shortages during the lean season between April and July, because of the floods and exacerbated by the violence in parts of the country

Villagers are fighting back and adapting to the crisis. With the help of Action Against Hunger, people in Paguir are learning how to grow rice in the flood waters. If successful, they will be the first generation of rice farmers in the district

Nyareek Biel moves the wood and wire frame used as a guide to where the rice should be planted

Joe Joe Zubahyea, the rice programme coordinator, teaches a group of women in Paguir how to broadcast – scatter – rice effectively. ‘My idea is that we can have a mother-to-mother support group for those women. I think it could take on a life of its own. People can plant their rice, teach other people, take some seeds and multiply them. That’s the dream I have,’ he says

Women prepare to scatter rice on their freshly cleared land. It is mostly women who are being trained to grow rice. It is hard, manual work

Women being taught rice-growing techniques. Although the project has been in Paguir for only a short time, it has already transformed the community. ‘It’s hard work,’ Nyagai Malual says. ‘But even if we stay here from now until the evening, I won’t get tired because I need to have more experience. In the future, I’ll carry on this experience, and I’ll make something for myself’

Taking rice seedlings to replant in the paddy. ‘I feel confident about how to cultivate rice and the other women feel the same,’ says Nyadim Mawich. ‘For us women this knowledge raises us in the eyes of the community. It makes other people trust us more and also respect us more because we have a new skill’

Rice seedlings being planted in the mud of a new paddy field

Women labour in the rice fields. It is backbreaking physical work

Martha Nyakueka Dak, left, and Nyatuor Patai plant rice. Dak was one of the first people trained in cultivation skills. She will now teach others in the village

Women admire the paddy field they have planted out during the day

They make their way home after a long day in the fields. Many have lost their homes and live in temporary shelters. When the rice is harvested, it will be shared equally among them

James Wuor weeds the paddy field beside his home. Wuor was too shy to join Zubahyea’s planting team, but he watched. After a month, he began planting rice in his flooded garden. He was amazed to see it flourish. ‘We normally grow sorghum and maize in a dry place. But when I saw the rice, it was growing in the water … I thought I could grow this rice so that my children can eat until the time that God takes this water away from us’

Nyakieth Kulang feeds her baby, Goy, and other children from the village with rice grown in the new paddies

‘Rice is great because it can be cooked properly in just a few minutes,’ says Kulang