Implementing Agency:
Department For International Development (PAND)

Managing Institute:
Actionaid UK

Contractor:
Actionaid - Ghana

Project Code: 025-680-010	Start Date: 01/04/1992	End Date: 31/03/1996
Commitment: £134,012	Status: Completed	Type of Funding: Bilateral - JFS

Project Background:
The project is located in Sapeliga and Teshie chiefdoms of Bawku West District in the Upper East Region of Ghana. The district shares a common boundary with Burkina Faso, and lies in the Sudanic climatic zone, immediately south of the Sahel. The two chiefdoms have a combined population of approximately 25 000 people. In the semi-arid Bawku-West the rainy season starts in April or May and usually lasts until September or October. Annual rainfall is between 900-1050mm, but is offset by the intense drought from November to April used by the relatively high rate of evaporation. The district has largely infertile sandy and rocky soils to the north and fertile sandy loams and alluvial soils in the southern parts. The most pressing problem identified by the communities is poor food security, due to low and unreliable levels of agricultural output and a limited ability to raise cash incomes. Environmental problems related to soil erosion and deforestation are lowerpriorities in the short term, but their long-term debilitating effects and the need to address these problems are also recognised by the communities. The majority of families experience a yearly hungry season , which starts when food supplies run low during the dry season and ends with the first new harvest, several months into the wet season. Every year families are forced to ration their food intake increasingly and in bad years many households experience famine conditions. During meeting with family heads in February 1991 - four months before the June harvest - over half were eating only one meal a day.

Project Objectives:
The overall aim of the project is to enhance the food producing capacity and overall standards of nutrition of farm families to assist them to create sources of cash for purchase of additional food, school fees, health services and other non-food needs to work on a participating basis with the community in order to sustain the developments and to contribute to the protection of the environment. The project consists of three major components: (a) Food Production (b) Income Generation and (c) Agriculture related environmental interventions. (A) FOOD PRODUCTION The objective of the food production component is that the food producing capacity and overall standards of nutrition of 3000 farm families in Sepeliga-Teshies programme area should be enhanced by June 1995. To achieve this objective the project needs are: To ensure that farmers have access to seed credit on reasonable terms and therefore have sufficient good quality seed to plant To shorten the hungry season and increase the variety of foods available from the early harvest To increase the efficiency with which farmers can prepare land and thereby enable them to prepare more land for planting. INCOME GENERATION The objective of the income generation component is that family cash income levels should be raised by June 1995 through supporting individuals production within group support systems for selected income generating activities. Thirty groups (20-50 people per group) will be assisted to raise sufficient regular income to pay for basic food and non-food needs by June 1995. To achieve these objectives the project needs: To raise agricultural incomes in the dry season: To take advantage of seasonal demand for livestock and thereby earn more income from livestock sales To obtain better prices for produce To promote saving and thereby gain access to credit To raise off-farm income (c) AGRICULTURE RELATED ENVIRONMENTAL INTERVENTIONS The objective of this component is that an estimated 300 interested farmers should be assisted to address agriculture related environmental problems through alley cropping, tree planting and soil and water conservation methods by June 1995. To achieve this objective the project needs: To increase tree cover To increase soil fertility and thereby to increase crop yields To rehabilitate abandoned land reduce loss of soil fertility.