The President of the Jimara Multi-Purpose Cassava Cooperative Society, Muhamadou Dahaba has expressed his delight in registering a bumper harvest in this cassava farming season.
Dahaba, a beneficiary of the defunct Cassava Out-Growers Scheme, was able to successfully multiply the improved variety of cassava on his farm, which yielded more cassava stems that helped him improve his farm thus increasing his income.
The Cassava Out-Growers Scheme dubbed: The ‘Mass Agricultural Cassava Productivity Project’ was envisaged to link industrial users of cassava like Aspuna with six hundred (600) youth farmers in the Greater Banjul Area, Lower and Upper River Regions, respectively.
The project was funded by the European Union (EU) funded Tekki Fii-a Wolof phrase meaning ‘Make it in The Gambia’ was a three years’ project implemented by the Deutsche Gessellschaft fur Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ).
The project trained 615 youth farmers in the three respective region cluster farmers into 22 cooperative societies, namely; LRR and URR with 7 cooperatives each, and GBA together with WCR got 8 cooperatives. Each of these cooperatives was trained and assisted to register as a cooperative society. Each member received 524 cassava stems improved variety to be multiplied in their farms.
Mr. Dahaba was able to mobilize young people in his district to be part of the cooperative society. During the farming season, he multiplied the supplied cassava stems on his farm and now has what he needs to produce yearly. The improved cassava stems have the potential to change his life by increasing his earnings and helping him to employ others.
Narrating his participation in GYIN Gambia programs, Dahaba won the Best Business Innovation of the Year 2020 of GYIN Gambia’s Rural Youth Awards in 2020. He became part of the Jimara Cooperative society under the Out-growers Scheme which GYIN Gambia coordinated.
After winning the award, he used the cash prize to buy some irrigation materials such as water pumping machines, water tanks, stand taps, and pipes to improve his farming business.