CIKOD / Groundswell: Agroecology and Community Farming in Ghana

The Centre for Indigenous Knowledge and Organizational Development (CIKOD) is working with 34 villages, traditional chiefs and women’s networks in Ghana to test and spread agroecological farming and the regeneration of trees on farmland. Building upon the expertise and hands-on knowledge of farmers themselves, these communities are developing solutions to deforestation, producing and consuming healthy food and generating income, as well as demonstrating the value of agroecology that can lay the foundation for policies that enable these types of local and sustainable models for addressing hunger, rural poverty, and the consequences of climate change.

CIKOD works in partnership with Groundswell International and its network of partners in West Africa. The partner network includes Association Nourrir Sans Détruire (ANSD), another The 11th Hour Project grantee that works in Burkina Faso to empower rural women and promote agroecology and the natural regeneration of trees.

“[I]f development is going to be sustainable, you look at the existing institutions in the communities, and secondly, for Africa, you need to look at women. Women are very important for development, from the point of the family, for the community and for the nation as whole.” –- CIKOD Director Bern Guri.