Food Security and Livelihoods Development

The Food Sovereignty and Livelihoods Development Porgramme has the strategic objective of improving household and community food security and resilience.

To LINK Ghana “Food Sovereignty” is the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems.

LINK Ghana believes in the collective control over our collective resources, rather than the control of our resources by multinational corporations and other foreign entities.

Food security is a goal while food sovereignty describes how our approach works to get there. Our approach is rooted in grassroots food movements with strong highlights on the need for a democratic food system, one that involves inputs from citizens as well as producers.

LINK Ghana Food Sovereignty has seven cardinal pillars namely;

Focuses on Food for People
Builds Knowledge and Skills
Works with Nature
Values Food Providers
Localizes Food Systems
Puts Control Locally
Food is Sacred

To achieve this strategic objective, the programme has the following sub objectives:

Sub Objective 1: Improved production and productivity of crops and livestock. Building the capacity of Farmer Based Cooperatives, LINK-Ghana provides the technical support to cooperatives to improve their production and incomes.

Improving women incomes through soap making

Improving household food security and incomes through dry season gardening

Improving household food security and incomes through livestock production

Improving household food security and incomes through Basket weaving

Sub Objective 2: Increased economic opportunities for women, youth and men. This includes the development of Community Based – Savings and Loans Group, linkages to Micro Financial Institutions as well as other traditional systems of savings that are indigenously rooted in the cultural and values of the people.

Mr. Pealore Zachary receiving certification award from VSL Associate as a trainer of VSLA

Sub Objective 3: Increased community resilience to climate change and disaster through the adoption of appropriate climatic and environmental technologies and practices such as Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration (FMNR), Tree planting, and Conservation Agriculture, promotion of indigenous and climate resistant crops.
Sub Objective 4: Improve community Natural Resource Base focusing on Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration (FMNR), Agroforestry, re enforcement of tree planting and sustainable utilization of natural resources such as shea trees, mahogany and others. Soil conservation practices is also of high significant and value to LINK –Ghana which collectively we collaborate with GoG and other partners to achieve.

Increased Crop Production evidence from FMNR

Sub Objective 5: Enhance community peace and co-existence to ensure sustainable livelihoods development.

Mr. Daniel Kansake (LINK-Ghana Programme Manager) with the Paramount chief of Wulensi and elders after a meeting to identify credible men and women as peace Advocates in the conflict prone district

Sub Objective 6: Reduced Impact of HIV and AIDS in communities especially among youth
Sub Objective 7: Influenced policies towards Strengthened livelihoods development