The Savannah Women Intergrated Development Agency (SWIDA-GHANA) with its partners has handed over items for shea picking and processing to hundred(100) women who are in to picking of sheanuts and 50 Youth who are into cassava processing Value Chain at the Nsunia community in the Bole District of Savannah Region on Friday, 7th September, 2024 to combat Violence Extremism.
Speaking to Bole based Nkilgi fm, the executive director for SWIDA-GHANA, Hajia Alima Sagito Sa-eed said they handed over to them 100 rain coats, 100 solar lights, 100 machetes, 100 pair of hand gloves, 100 Wallington boots, 10 energy saving stoves with chenerry and 5 drying platforms for their use.
She said they identified the youth who are in to gari processing which they are building capacity to be strong and access resources to be able to produce gari for trade and livelihood.
Hajia Alima Sagito Sa-eed added that their project supported the women with training and the youth also with training in quality processing of shea, how to pick it well,how to process it well and to market access linkages.
She added that they train them on environmental conscious practice that will help manage the environment whilst improving on their health.
Hajia Alima Sagito Sa-eed thanked their donors which is the UNDP, Australian Aid, Embassy of Denmark, German Cooperation and Norway.
The Peace and Governance Analyst of the United Nations Development Programme(UNDP) Madam Melody Azinim said the initiative is part of the bigger project known as Preventing Violence Extremism in the Atlantic corridor which has Ghana,Burkina Faso,Togo and Benin as beneficiary countries.
She said they mostly focus on the Northern parts of the countries, except Burkina Faso which includes the Southern part.
She added that the project is more towards ensuring that the communities are safe from the issues of Violence Extremism because they have seen the damage it has caused in other countries.
Madam Melody Azinim added that as part of their work which is developing some evidence, finding out that what the real issues are and the vulnerabilities and one of the vulnerability issue that they find out was unemployment issues of youth and women that makes them vulnerable to be recruited.
She again said as part of the project, they are supporting some selected communities with livelihood options and Nsunia is one of rhe communities that is benefitting.
She said with that, they are providing them with the tools, such as machetes,rain coats, hand gloves, drying platforms, energy saving stoves with Chenerry and Cassava processing Value Chain.
Madam Melody Azinim said the UNDP is happy to partner with SWIDA-GHANA because they are a local civil society organisation and the work in the communities and knows what happens in the community as well.
She conclusively said besides they working at the national level, they also want to partner and strengthen Civil Society Organisations so they will also be able to do their work better and hence why they are working with SWIDA-GHANA as well and they believe that the support will go a long way to be able to address this vulnerabilities and to also ensure that poverty and unemployment is a thing of the past in this communities.
One of the beneficiary women Salamatu Kwesinyankor, spoke on behalf of the entire community to Nkilgi fm thank SWIDA-GHANA and its donors for the training and handing over of the equipments.
She said SWIDA-GHANA with support from its donors took them to the Bole which is the district capital to train them and finally the brought alot of things to donate to them and also constructed 5 drying platforms for them.
She there are alot of communities in the Bole District but SWIDA-GHANA and its donors considered them and they are every happy and will make sure they will put all the taught and handed over to them to good use.
Salamatu Kwesinyankor said with all these, the sheanuts will not be contaminated and pick it will be easier too.
She added that they are also support 50 youth with Cassava processing machines to process the Cassava to gari as well and they will be able to provide for themselves and families.
Source: nkilgifmonline.com
