Women groups in the Asaloko community in the Bongo District of the Upper East Region have been empowered by the Centre for Indigenous Knowledge and Organisational Development (CIKOD), an NGO to go into indigenous vegetable farming to help improve upon their nutritional status and economic livelihoods.
It least 50 women who were trained showcased their cultivated vegetable farms to the over 250 community members and other stakeholders at a forum in the Asaloko community.
The beneficiaries also held a food bazaar as a way of encouraging community members to revisit farming in indigenous vegetables which were being abandoned.
The Deputy Executive Director of CIKOD, Mr Wilberforce Laate, stated that his organisation in partnership with Water Aid Ghana over the years, has been implementing Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) projects in some selected communities in the district.
He said among the objectives of the programme was to build the capacity of the women and keep them healthy, in addition to keeping the environment tidy in line with the WASH project .
The leader of the women group, Mrs Mary Asaah, stated that apart from the vegetables improving upon their nutritional status, they would not also depend their husbands to provide money to buy vegetables for cooking as they were doing in the past.
The queen mother of the Bongo Traditional Area, Mrs Christiana Asindikye Ngee, who commended the NGOs and its partners for the support, said the traditional council was very happy with the project intervention.
She called on other women groups in the district and outside the district to take advantage of the project by also going into vegetable farming to help provide them with livelihoods and improve upon their families’ nutritional status.
FROM SAMUEL AKAPULE, ASALOKO
