EMMA ALBERICI, PRESENTER: An Australian pensioner has ventured into one of the most dangerous regions to help some of the world's most vulnerable people.

Seventy-three-year-old Sydney woman Barbara Ferguson has committed herself to helping a desperate group of pygmies living in the Democratic Republic of Congo where, by some estimates, millions of people have perished in nearly two decades of conflict.

Alexandra Fisher has the story.

ALEXANDRA FISHER, REPORTING: It's remote, spectacular and dangerous. Welcome to the eastern edge of the Democratic Republic of Congo. A country stained by the bloodiest conflict since World War II. It's perhaps the last place you'd expect to find a retiree from the Australian suburbs.

Barbara Ferguson devotes her retirement to improving the lives of one of the world's most persecuted minorities.

BARBARA FERGUSON, PHILANTHROPIST: That's our houses. I shouldn't say our houses, they're our pygmy brothers and sisters' houses.

ALEXANDRA FISHER: It's risky territory and the trip out is bumpy. The 73-year-old is excited to be back after six months away.

(Sounds of chanting and singing)

It's a far happier meeting than Barbara's first encounter with the pygmies back in 2010.

BARBARA FERGUSON: They were in an IDP camp, a camp for people who were displaced from within the country, and they were living in conditions that were so miserable, I really was so moved. They were discriminated against, they were pushed to the back of the camp, living in little grass humpies that they'd made and their children were half naked, dirty. They were lucky if they ate a couple of times a week and I said I am so sorry, I don't know how but I promise I am going to help you.

ALEXANDRA FISHER: And that's exactly what she did, buying a small plot of land and building 65 houses for about 170 pygmies.

MUBOWA, PYGMY CHIEF (TRANSLATED): With the land and houses we got from Barbara, we've earned more respect from other tribes.

ALEXANDRA FISHER: The Bambenga pygmies are traditionally forest dwellers but for decades they've been forced from the forests by logging, land seizures and war.

MUBOWA, (TRANSLATED): Life in the forest was good because there was no-one controlling us. We could go out and hunt antelope and come home and eat it. But now that we are living among other people, we have to get on with them and live with the kind of rules they live with.

ALEXANDRA FISHER: Barbara's work with the pygmies is just the latest chapter in a life dedicated to helping the world's abandoned. She works tirelessly to raise funds for the pygmies and uses her own pension

money to fund projects.

The latest project is a fishing venture which the pygmy chief Mubowa believes will herald the beginning of his people's self-sufficiency.

MUBOWA, (TRANSLATED): This project will help us to be self-reliant because with the fish we catch we can sell half and keep the other half so this way we won't be beggars because one of the things that distinguishes this community now is begging.

ALEXANDRA FISHER: The only problem is Mubowa and the other pygmies can't swim and have never fished.

BARBARA FERGUSON: I tried to persuade him he shouldn't be a fisherman because I was so worried he might drown and I told him, "You have so many responsibilities. Don't you think you should stay out of the boat?" But, no, he's going to be a fisherman too.

ALEXANDRA FISHER: And she's rallying behind the project, calling in UN peace-keepers to help get the boat in the water. With the boat launched and the first nets cast, it's time to bless the project with the blood of a sacrificed goat.

BARBARA FERGUSON: I couldn't watch what was happening to the goat but I guess this is part of the ritual, it's part of the culture, not just of the pygmies but of all the Congolese and it's an important way to bless this whole enterprise.

MUBOWA, (TRANSLATED): I am very much delighted by what Barbara is doing for us. I don't have the real words to express what she is doing for us. All we can do for her is pray that we get stronger so that she can see the result of what she is doing now.

BARBARA FERGUSON: My whole idea is that this will be - this village, this little village will be a model for how you can help people even in the middle of a war zone, you help people to self-sufficiency by an integrated program of education, of literacy, of nutrition and health and income generation so I want to stay with them until they can manage on their own.

ALEXANDRA FISHER: Barbara's time here is limited and leaving is never easy.

BARBARA FERGUSON: It's very hard to leave the people here, to go home to all of the wonderful things we have in Australia and to know that their lives can be snuffed out so quickly.

ALEXANDRA FISHER: And her fears were soon realised. Since filming this, one of the pygmy men drowned while taking a boat out. He was just 22.

Barbara will be back in the Congo in a few months.

Alexandra Fisher, Lateline.