A small group of women in Kagwel (a lakeside village in Kenya's Kisumu County) are defying longstanding cultural prohibitions to work as fisherfolk on Lake Victoria, driven by economic hardship worsened by climate change. Rhoda Ongoche Akech, now 61, became the community's first female fisher in 2002, facing beliefs that women on the water would bring bad luck or scare away fish; three more women have since joined her, with resistance gradually fading as neighbours grew accustomed to the sight. The shift comes as rising water temperatures are depleting fish stocks in the lake — which supports more than 42 million people — yet the women remain in legal limbo, with local authorities declining to formally recognise them as fisherfolk despite official estimates suggesting around 1,000 women now work in the sector across the lake.