West Gonja: Tree Aid holds key stakeholder workshop for cashew value chain linkages

Tree Aid, a non-governmental organization has held a stakeholder workshop for cashew value chain linkages aimed at providing a platform to establish linkages between producers, buyers and processors.

The stakeholders' engagement was held on Saturday, December 18 at the Damongo Catholic Guest House conference hall in the West Gonja Municipality of the Savannah Region.

The cashew value chain linkages workshop was also to discuss issues that would boost the cashew industry in the region and the country at large.

Speaking in an interview with this reporter, the project officer for Ghana Rural Agriculture Cashew Enterprises for West Gonja, Mr. Eric H. Botir, said the meeting was tailored at bringing all cashew farmers within West Gonja Municipal who are into Village Tree Enterprises (VTE) formed by Tree Aid.

According to him, local processors were brought from Kumasi, Accra, and Tema to teach the participants ways to process their cashew to increase their income and also help them to get their nutrition.

"The importance of today's meeting is just to link all the groups from Tree Aid in the West Gonja Municipal to the outside processors and these processors are people who are already into this business for a very long time", he said.

He continued, "because this is a new area, we are trying to tap into knowledge and to also see how these farmers could sign contracts with them and sell cashew to them."