Farming for the future: How business unlocks the potential of farmers in Ghana

03 December, 2009 @ 16:17

As the sun rises on another day in the rural community of Wiiga, Ghana, farmers eagerly begin to tend to their land. For countless hours under a burning sky, these small-scale farmers tirelessly cultivate their crops to ensure that their family will have enough to eat in the coming days. If their land yields a humble meal and the animals are fed, the farmers in Wiiga close each day with a bittersweet notion that, at least for tomorrow, life will carry on.

This is not an uncommon scene across West and Southern Africa. Here, most farmers only have the skills, knowledge and inputs to farm for day-to-day survival, and not as an ongoing source of income. Business has the transformative power to change this, and Engineers Without Borders is working in Ghana, Burkina Faso, Malawi and Zambia to make it a reality.

Through a wide range of partners – including farmers groups, development organizations, government and businesses – EWB is helping farmers shift from farming for survival, to farming as a business. This means that for the first time, farmers have the skills to monitor their production, track profits, mitigate planting risks, and create a lasting income.

In hardworking and entrepreneurial communities like Wiiga, EWB’s approach is giving farmers the opportunity to think towards the future.

Here, we are working with extension agents from the Ghanaian Ministry of Food and Agriculture to implement the Agriculture as a Business program among farmer groups in the community. The program, created jointly by EWB and the Ministry, covers eight workshop topics that equip farmers with the business skills to increase their crop yields, and link with market opportunities to earn a lasting income.

In Wiiga, the Asongtaaba farmer group is certainly no exception. Last year Franklin Aziz, the group’s forward-thinking extension agent from the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, implemented the Agriculture as a Business program to strengthen the group and provide them with business skills.

In just one short year, Franklin has seen impressive change. The group created business plans which showed that guinea fowl would be more profitable over animals like goats or cattle. This has ensured that farmers are now able to earn the best income possible, yet, without the Agriculture as a Business program, this would never have been identified.

Even now as the guinea fowls have started laying eggs, the group secretary has been recording the amount of eggs sold and the revenue earned with the hope of best managing cash flow. This is allowing the Asongtaaba group to save money, and even generate support from other development partners because of their proven productivity.

Only a year ago, farmers in the Asongtaaba group might have only dreamed of thinking past their daily realities. However, because EWB’s approach is providing critical business skills, over 500 farmers in communities like Wiiga across Ghana’s Bawku West district now have the opportunity to increase their incomes and build a more prosperous future.

As EWB moves through the coming year, we will continue using business to unleash opportunity for thousands of farmers. In doing so we bear in mind the small community of Wiiga, where farmers now look towards the horizon with promise.