The Girls to Women Foundation, a girl-child and women empowerment nongovernmental organization working in the North has recognized the significant contribution of smallholder women farmers in some selected rural communities in the northern region towards the socioeconomic development of Ghana.
As a result, the organization last Thursday, April 3, 2025, held a day’s workshop to boost the knowledge and skills of some selected 60 women farmers in Climate Smart Regenerative Agriculture, Increasing Crops yields through enhance farming techniques and integrated pest management as well as Entrepreneurship and agribusiness management: Farming as a Business among other topics.
In her remarks, the Executive Director for Girls to Women Foundation, Hajia Mariam Iddrisu, said the capacity building training was part of the organization’s Rural Women Farmers Project with funding support from the African Women Development Fund.
“We chose to celebrate rural women to mark the International Women’s Day which was recently celebrated under the theme: For all women and girls, right to equality and empowerment. For us as an organization, the 2025 theme resonates so well with our vision and that is to work in enhancing gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls” she asserted.
She emphasized her outfit over the period has implemented various activities to empower women and girls through skills development and educating women on how to become financially independent and economically empowered.
“…We decided to celebrate our rural women, our indigenous women, our informal sector women who are rarely recognized for their achievements and for their contribution towards Ghana’s socio economic development.”
In her view, Hajia Mariam intimated that very little is always heard about the achievements of the determined and hardworking women from the underprivileged communities during the annual global celebration reiterating the decision why the Girls to Women Foundation brought these rural women together to recognize their efforts and honour them.
“So this program is not only to acknowledge their contributions but to honour them and to build their capacities in various areas of agriculture” she added.
The beneficiaries each received a knapsack praying machine, wellington boots and undisclosed amount of cash to aid their farming activities.
Meanwhile, the Northern Regional Director of Agriculture, Hajia Hawa Musah, for her part disclosed that the government through the Ministry of Food and Agriculture has put in place a policy measure to ensure that women benefit at least 40% of every agriculture intervention in the country.
“Like we know, in the rural setup women farmers do a lot – they are involved in land preparation, planting, harvesting, agribusiness, value addition and the nutrition of the family” she stated.
Hajia Hawa stressed that these rural women also contributed significantly to their family incomes.
