Cadbury Awards $1.7m Cocoa Community Projects

Kraft Food, the parent company of Cadbury Ghana Limited, has fulfilled its promise of helping to sustain cocoa production in Ghana.

It has award contracts to the tune of $1.7 million to execute development projects in communities where the commodity is grown.

The move is part of its Challenge Fund under the Cocoa partnership Programme, which is being undertaken in collaboration with World Vision, UNDP and Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) to support farmers in 206 communities within seven selected districts.

The Cadbury Cocoa Partnership, a £30-million investment, was established in Ghana in 2008 to help build thriving rural cocoa growing communities with the aim of ensuring sustainable cocoa supply chain.

In 2009, the Cadbury Cocoa Partnership Programme initiated the Community Challenge Fund with seed capital of £550,000 to support sustainable community development projects.

On Tuesday, June 19, nine contractors signed contracts to commence 11 projects in separate cocoa growing communities.

The projects would cover the provision of potable water, health posts, place of convenience for the community, classroom blocks, teachers’ bungalow, ICT centre and school libraries.

The beneficiary communities submitted proposals to indicate their specific needs after which 11 communities in six districts were selected out of 50 applications.

The selected projects include a resource centre for the midwifery training school at Goaso and a three-unit classroom block for the Fawohoyeden Junior High School, both in the Asunafo North District, in Brong Ahafo Region.

Others are a four-unit teachers’ living quarters at Sekyere Adiembra in the Mpohor Wassa East District, a Kindergarten block at Bunsuso in the Fanteakwa District, an Information Communication Technology (ICT) Centre for Kofi Pare in the Suhum-Kraboa-Coaltar District and a health centre with nurses quarters at Esaaso in the West Akim District.

There will be 200 motorized spraying machines, 400 manual knapsack spraying machines with training for 100 communities in Amansie West, Asunafo North, Fanteakwa, Mpohor Wassa East, New Juaben, Suhum-Kraboa-Coaltar and West Akim Districts.

Yaa Peprah-Amekudzi, Programme Director Cadbury Cocoa Partnership, said the intervention was in response to challenging physical development needs of the communities under which the Cadbury Cocoa partnership was being implemented.

She expressed the hope that the Cadbury Cocoa Partnership Programme and other subsequent projects would complement government-supported development and community-led development as well as other interventions financed by the Partnership to provide thriving cocoa producing communities with sustainable cocoa supply chain.

James Boateng, Managing Director of Cadbury Ghana Limited said “this is a truly corporate socially responsibility programmes which encompass all stakeholders as it involves the members of the communities, researchers, scientists, academia and many more.”

He added that “it is yet another initiative to ensure that our overall initiative to ensure sustainable cocoa economy for Ghana is achieved. We are also ensuring that the poor farmers who mean so much to the cocoa industry are not let out.”

Alhaji Alhassan Bukari, National President of Ghana Cocoa, Coffee and Shea nut farmers association, commended Cadbury for the initiative and urged them to extend the Cocoa Partnership Programme to the Central and Volta regions.

He also encouraged them to consider the Coffee and sheanut industry which seem to be lagging behind even though they are potential sources of higher foreign exchange earnings.

Latter in an interview, Nana Osei Tutu of Trump Construction Company limited, one of the construction firms which have been awarded the projects, promised to meet the timeline for the execution of the project to ensure their delivery on schedule to the communities.

Anna Swaithes, Head of Development Cadbury Cocoa Partnership Global Programmes, signed the agreement on behalf of Food Craft while the contactors took turns to express their commitment to undertake the projects.