Ghana

Project: Northern Ghana Food Security Resilient Project Category: Food Security

Where?

The Republic of Ghana is a country in West Africa, which borders Ivory Coast to the west, Burkina Faso to the north, Togo to the east, and the Gulf of Guinea to the south.

Why?

The increases in international food prices in 2007 and early 2008 have had negative effects on the Upper West and Northern regions of Ghana. The global food crisis has resulted in the general increases in food and other commodity prices. Now many people cannot meet basic nutritional need even if they devoted their entire income on food. The problem with food production is that small farmers often do not benefit from higher food prices since most of them grow just enough to survive on. In the rural areas of the north increased food production is not related to improved technology but rather to the extension of the cropped area. Smallholder farmers who simply lack access to better seeds, fertilizer, proper land preparation, and with inadequate storage facilities dominate food production in the targeted areas. The result is very low crop yields, high crop storage losses and limited processing of farm produce. Lack of money compel the majority of these farmers to rapidly dispose of their produce for quick cash at non-competitive prices soon after the harvest only to face food shortage in the months before the next growing season. Current price volatility is expected to worsen the already poor access to food by market-dependent households.

What?

Most of the farmers in the Northern region grow various crops for home consumption and sell the surplus on the market. The need of all beneficiaries is adequate food at affordable prices but their constraint is limited income. ADRA will help the farmers with better seeds, fertilizer and introduce new agricultural methods. ADRA will aims to build the capacity of 10,000 resource poor and vulnerable small-scale rural farmers who suffer chronic food insecurity and poverty to improve their food security and incomes level. The project will help address the ongoing food shortages in these two poor regions of Ghana by improving the efficiency of smallholder production and marketing activities. This will enable farmers to build up their food and seed stocks in order to provide resilience against climatic, economic, health-related or other shocks. It will also enable smallholders to improve their incomes via sustainable links to larger scale businesses that purchase smallholder produce. The project will enable them and their beneficiaries to bounce back rapidly in order to reduce the negative effects of the hiking food prices with its adverse effect on nutrition but also to improve their income through participation in the value chain that will link them to markets.

How?

Farmers will be trained in appropriate crop production practices and also be supported with tools, seeds and fertilizer. Farmers are expected to increase their productivity from the current 300kg/acre to 900kg/acre, 200% increase. This means food to eat and surplus to sell. Beneficiary farmers will be trained to plough back a portion of their profits to purchase a larger quantity of seeds and fertilizer that will enable them to expand their farm sizes and also maintain higher productivity levels.

Who?

Funding is provided by the European Commission and ADRA-UK

When?

The project will start in January 2010 and last 22 months.

This project was completed. Read the EC news report here!