Going Straight to the Farm to Help Feed the Hungry

On a warm, cloudy day in Ghana’s coastal savanna, Isaac Agbovie expertly navigates the dips and divots of a rural road atop a slender motorcycle. He’s on his way to meet his mother at her farm, but when he arrives there’s little time for pleasantries. For Agbovie, this is a work trip, and he quickly begins to help her harvest watermelons and green beans and place them in crates.

Hired in July 2023, Agbovie is one of five field coordinators for Food For All Africa, among the first food banks established in West Africa. The new employees are part of the food bank’s strategy to improve the nutritional content of the food they provide.

Moving Quickly with Volunteers and Equipment

Because produce perishes quickly, Agbovie recruits local volunteers to help harvest, thanking them with a hearty lunch, and arranges for a Food For All Africa refrigerated truck to load up the day’s haul and head to a warehouse in Shai Hills, about an hour away.

There, a team of seven staffers unload the watermelons and other produce, which is cleaned, and sorted before it’s stored. Some might be made into juice and frozen, and the rest of it will be packed for distribution.

Food For All Africa employees join community members to offload food boxes for the Fuveme community in Ghanas Volta region. (Photo Credit The Global FoodBanking Network, Julius Ogundiran)

“For us as food bankers, we understand that what we offer is more than food,” said Ellijah Amoo Addo, founder and executive director of Food For All Africa. “We become a bridge.

“The language we’re using is the food. But the identity we’re building is community. And for me, that’s the beauty of food banking.”

About 45 percent of the food produced in Ghana goes to waste, while about 40 percent of children in the country go hungry, according to Addo. Determined to turn this around, Addo and his team created the Agricultural Food Loss Recovery Project in 2022 to reduce food loss in Ghana’s agricultural sector by 40 percent in the next five years.

The Rockefeller Foundation Helps Make it Work

Funding from The Rockefeller Foundation and The Global FoodBanking Network accelerated the program’s growth, allowing for the purchase of two all-terrain cycles so field coordinators can access hard-to-reach communities, as well as the 1.4-ton capacity refrigerated truck and the new warehouse, which can store up to 325 tons of produce and 56 tons of dried food.

In 2022, less than 1 percent of the food Food For All Africa recovered came directly from farms. Just a year later, 28 percent of their food was sourced from the agricultural supply chain.

“Since we received the funding, it ignited a light for us,” Addo said. “We’ve been able to provide a more nutritious, health-focused support system to those we serve. And it also helps reduce food loss and waste. Above all, it helps us support malnourished families and children.”