Empowering women to improve farming productivity in northern Ghana

While Ghana has one of the fastest-growing economies in Africa and is one of the few countries on track to meet its Millennium Development Goal of halving poverty by 2015, stark inequality exists between the northern and southern halves of the country — the north has myriad economic, health, environmental, and educational challenges, which have contributed to massive inequalities for the majority of the 4.3 million people living there.

Low levels of literacy, poor nutrition, inconsistent weather patterns, geographic isolation from market centers and little knowledge of modern farming practices have hindered northern Ghana’s productivity. This has also led to high volumes of imported staple foods. Cereal (maize, rice, millet and sorghum) and legume (soybean, cowpea and groundnuts) crops are predominantly grown by smallholder farmers. Up to 90 percent of these smallholders have land holdings of fewer than 2 hectares and employ traditional agricultural practices. Much of the work is done by hand and is extremely labor-intensive, which also limits production and opportunities for expansion.

There is little to no mechanization of farming operations, and the use of farm power sources is often limited to animals plowing and carting produce.