Carter Center Global Health Efforts - Ghana

Activities By Country

Fighting Disease: Ghana

Working hand in hand with the Ghanaian Ministry of Farming and Agriculture, the Carter Center's Sasakawa-Global 2000 Program began assisting farmers in the Ashanti and Central regions of Ghana in 1986 to improve food security. The program, in partnership with the Sasakawa Africa Association, led by Nobel Peace Prize winner Norman Borlaug until his death in 2009, has been part of a larger joint initiative that has helped more than 8 million small-scale, sub-Saharan farmers.

The prescription was simple: Farmers were provided with credit for fertilizers and seeds to grow production test plots. Following successful harvests, which usually exceed previous harvests by 200 to 400 percent, farmers taught their neighbors about the new technologies, creating a ripple effect to stimulate food self-reliance in the nation.

The program also has assisted the Ghanaian people to develop and cultivate "obantanpa," or "good nursing mother," an improved type of maize that yields as much corn per acre as other maize varieties yet contains a more complete form of protein. Obantanpa, also known as quality protein maize, is especially important for infants weaned off their mothers' breast milk with maize porridge, a food with low nutritional value. Infant mortality in Ghana often is linked to malnutrition, primarily because the maize porridge lacks complete nutrition, preventing the development of strong, healthy bodies that can ward off disease and infection.

The introduction and production of this superior maize have decreased the incidence of protein malnutrition significantly.

Read the Atlanta Journal-Constitution Article: Altered Corn Helps Ghana's Children Fight Malnutrition >

Improving crop yields was only half the battle, as farmers then had to find ways to sell their surplus crops. Transporting these surpluses can be costly and inefficient. Often, road conditions are poor or impassable, and farmers rarely have places to store their harvested crops. These obstacles often force farmers to sell their harvest during peak harvesting season alongside other farmers, greatly reducing the margin of profit. The program helped train farmers to better market themselves and identify local markets where they can sell their produce. Projects also focused on post-harvest technologies, including methods for processing and storing grains. In Ghana, farmers can get loans from the national Agricultural Development Bank through membership in a farming association, and association members are responsible for repayment as a group. Neighboring countries in the program that share crop seasons are encouraged to foster lasting cooperative efforts to share farming techniques and market their produce to each other. Currently, officials from Tanzania, Malawi, Ethiopia, Mali, Guinea, and Senegal are studying Ghana's experience with the hope of establishing similar agricultural programs in their own countries.

These successes and others in agricultural development programming led the joint effort to end the Center's in-country agricultural activities in Ghana in 2003.