The Net Organisation for Youth Empowerment and Development (NOYED-Ghana), a non-governmental organisation operating in northern Ghana, has built the capacity of rural women on the cultivation of rice and shea nut in the Nasia community in the West Mamprusi District.
They were equipped with knowledge and skills in rice and shea nut processing to enable them improve their incomes to cater for their families, especially the education of the girl-child.
The Executive Director of NOYED-Ghana, Mr Alhassan Abdulai Iddi, noted that the training provided participants with positive opportunities that existed in the rice and shea-nut industries and the need for the women farmers to take advantage of them to enhance their living standards.
He said NOYED aimed at promoting girl-child education in deprived areas and improving the livelihood of the vulnerable.
The workshop, he said, also helped to improve the knowledge of the women in the value chain of rice and shea nut processing.
Mr Iddi assured the participants of NOYED-Ghana’s continuous support for the women groups, especially those who took the education of their children more seriously, in line with the interest of the Voluntary Service Overseas and Comic Relief, donors of the programme.
Mr Issifu Seidu Haruna, a facilitator at the workshop, indicated that there were about 1,060 women in the district, who had so far benefited from such initiatives. He added that it had boosted their skills and knowledge in income generating activities.
Mr Haruna observed that lack of capital for women to promote their businesses had been a hindrance to their progress and appealed to financial institutions to extend their services to rural areas to ensure that vulnerable persons benefited from them.
Madam Ramatu Mahama, a participant in the workshop, expressed concern about the lack of access to capital, which she said had been a major hindrance to many women groups in the area, and called on government and other NGOs to assist them to improve the quality of their produce.
Source: GNA
