In Anamaase, Ghana, the New Frontier Farmers and Processor group is led by the village's chief. Osbararima Mana Tibi II is a self described "young leader (he's 50 years old) with a love for the environment." He took it upon himself when he became chief, he says, to help revive farmland and improve the lives of the farmers in his village of about 5,000 people. And the chief is also helping farmers become more business-oriented. "We're always thinking about how to process the crops we're growing," he says. According to him, farmers don't have a lot of bargaining power in most villages in Ghana, but "processing gives them more leverage.
One of the groups' biggest accomplishments since it began in 1992, according to Chief Mana Tibi, is organizing palm oil processing groups. Typically, farmers collect palm oil fruits and sell them to a processor, instead of processing and extracting the oil-and having the opportunity to make additional income- themselves.
But by "coming together," says the Chief, and building three palm oil processing centers, farmers are able to boil, ferment, and press the palm fruits themselves, allowing them to make a better profit. The processing plants, or "service centers," which are run mainly by women, also help save time and labor because the community is working together to process and then package the oil. And because the three facilities aren't enough to "fill the need" they're working on building three or four additional processing plants.
The group is also involved in helping restore watersheds and barren land through agroforestry. They've started growing nitrogen-fixing trees, including Lucina to help restore soils, as well other trees, such as the so-called "green gold of Ghana," moringa. When they're processed into powder, the leaves of the moringa tree are very high in protein and can be manufactured into formula for malnourished children. And because the processing of moringa into powder "generates a lot of trash," says Chief Tibi, the stalks and other leftover parts of the plant can be used as fodder for animals. New Frontier is also providing moringa seedlings to a group of 40 people living with HIV/AIDS, who not only use moringa as a nutritional supplement, but are also growing moringa to earn income.
The group is doing some of its own community-based research by testing the effect moringa has on livestock. According to their research, feeding sheep moringa leaves has reduced fat in the meat dramatically, "making it taste more like bushmeat," and it lasts longer when it is preserved than regular mutton. They've also found that goats who eat moringa are healthier.
In addition, the Chief is hoping that the business opportunities provided by moringa and other crops, will help make agriculture and agribusiness more attractive to youth and prevent their "drift" to the cities. He's created a Amanmae Fe, or home of tradition, a place in the community that uses dancing and music "to bait the youth," says the Chief. By bringing them together, he hopes the youth will learn more about their traditions and the ways of growing food that were in Ghana before Western interventions, as well as more modern practices that can help increase production and improve their livelihoods.
Thank you for reading! If you enjoy our diary every day we invite you to get involved: 1. Comment on our daily posts-we check comments everyday and look forward to a regular ongoing discussion with you. 2. Receive weekly updates-Sign up for our "Nourishing the Planet" weekly newsletter at the blog by clicking here and receive regular blog and travel updates.
In Anamaase, Ghana, the New Frontier Farmers and Processor group is led by the village's chief. Osbararima Mana Tibi II is a self described "young leader (he's 50 years old) with a love for the environment." He took it upon himself when he became chief, he says, to help revive farmland and improve the lives of the farmers in his village of about 5,000 people. And the chief is also helping farmers become more business-oriented. "We're always thinking about how to process the crops we're growing," he says. According to him, farmers don't have a lot of bargaining power in most villages in Ghana, but "processing gives them more leverage.
One of the groups' biggest accomplishments since it began in 1992, according to Chief Mana Tibi, is organizing palm oil processing groups. Typically, farmers collect palm oil fruits and sell them to a processor, instead of processing and extracting the oil-and having the opportunity to make additional income- themselves.
But by "coming together," says the Chief, and building three palm oil processing centers, farmers are able to boil, ferment, and press the palm fruits themselves, allowing them to make a better profit. The processing plants, or "service centers," which are run mainly by women, also help save time and labor because the community is working together to process and then package the oil. And because the three facilities aren't enough to "fill the need" they're working on building three or four additional processing plants.
The group is also involved in helping restore watersheds and barren land through agroforestry. They've started growing nitrogen-fixing trees, including Lucina to help restore soils, as well other trees, such as the so-called "green gold of Ghana," moringa. When they're processed into powder, the leaves of the moringa tree are very high in protein and can be manufactured into formula for malnourished children. And because the processing of moringa into powder "generates a lot of trash," says Chief Tibi, the stalks and other leftover parts of the plant can be used as fodder for animals. New Frontier is also providing moringa seedlings to a group of 40 people living with HIV/AIDS, who not only use moringa as a nutritional supplement, but are also growing moringa to earn income.
The group is doing some of its own community-based research by testing the effect moringa has on livestock. According to their research, feeding sheep moringa leaves has reduced fat in the meat dramatically, "making it taste more like bushmeat," and it lasts longer when it is preserved than regular mutton. They've also found that goats who eat moringa are healthier.
In addition, the Chief is hoping that the business opportunities provided by moringa and other crops, will help make agriculture and agribusiness more attractive to youth and prevent their "drift" to the cities. He's created a Amanmae Fe, or home of tradition, a place in the community that uses dancing and music "to bait the youth," says the Chief. By bringing them together, he hopes the youth will learn more about their traditions and the ways of growing food that were in Ghana before Western interventions, as well as more modern practices that can help increase production and improve their livelihoods.
Thank you for reading! If you enjoy our diary every day we invite you to get involved: 1. Comment on our daily posts-we check comments everyday and look forward to a regular ongoing discussion with you. 2. Receive weekly updates-Sign up for our "Nourishing the Planet" weekly newsletter at the blog by clicking here and receive regular blog and travel updates.
I had an interesting discussion with someone in which it was wondered why Sonia Sotomayor wasn't questioned/rumored to be a lesbian as much as now. Divorced in 1983 and engaged one other time, "uppity" woman, active with women's groups, distinctly masculine voice... you know the drill. She replied that perhaps it was because Sotomayor was married and that put an end to the speculation.
Of course, marriage has always been an institution that gay, lesbian and bisexual individuals have used, for better or worse, to put an end to harrassment/rumors from family and community members. In fact, I think Charlie Crist did it just so he could get on the shortlist for VP in 2008. I even know several gay friends of mine who were married- some with kids- and came out of the closet later in life.
Which is why I don't expect pieces like this to put an end to the speculation:
Elena Kagan is not a lesbian, one of her best friends told POLITICO Tuesday night, responding to persistent rumors and innuendo about the Supreme Court nominee's personal life.
"I've known her for most of her adult life and I know she's straight," said Sarah Walzer, Kagan's roommate in law school and a close friend since then. "She dated men when we were in law school, we talked about men - who in our class was cute, who she would like to date, all of those things. She definitely dated when she was in D.C. after law school, when she was in Chicago - and she just didn't find the right person."
Walzer, half amused and half appalled to be discussing her friend's sexual orientation, agreed to be interviewed after Kagan's supporters decided they should tactfully put an end to the rumor, which White House officials had already tried to squelch in background interviews with reporters. She said she decided to talk to POLITICO because the discussion of Kagan's personal life has become a "distraction."
"It's taking away from substantive discussion of the issues from a really substantive person who deserves to be given the opportunity to address the substantive issues," she said.
Another friend, former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, a member of Kagan's social circle at Princeton University, wanted to make the same point as Walzer. "I did not go out with her, but other guys did," he said in an email Tuesday night. "I don't think it is my place to say more."
The reason is because in this culture, I've found that not being married at Kagan's age or, as Kagan's best friend put it, "didn't find the right person" is, to many, the same as being a lesbian. What's one of the most common things parents tell their kids when they come out of the closet? You guessed it- "Maybe you just haven't found the right guy/girl yet."
So while I'm hearing a lot of "well, that's that" from a lot of my peers as if it will put an end to the speculation, I doubt it will at all. The reason I think that is two fold. First, imagine if Lindsey Graham's or Charlie Crist's close friend came out and said the same thing. More people would chuckle and shake their head than believe it. Second, in the eyes of many, women of Kagan's stature, looks, romantic situation, etc. will always be suspicious. Culture, and people's personal feelings derived from it, simply trump news reports and sources when it comes to this kind of thing.
Over the years Hollywood has produced a vivid record of the immigrant
experience in America. Although many movies are controversial on matters
of fact, they nonetheless provide a valuable insight into how immigrants
are seen and represented in the mainstream.
The film industry is significantly positioned to examine America's
changing cultural identity and bring to the public's attention the
stories of immigrant communities. Ever since the 1920s studios have
presented audiences with dramatized accounts of the individual
immigrant's experience adjusting to America and their attempts at upward
mobility. Be they nostalgic or critical, such films helped fill a gap in
the general public's knowledge and pave the way for more socially
conscious filmmaking.
Wednesday April 14 will be a landmark day for ensuring the equality of all voices in the American public sphere. It is the day that Ugly Betty, the popular ABC series chronicling a young Mexican-American woman’s adventures of beating the odds in the Big Apple, will come to an end after four seasons. That same evening, The Opportunity Agenda will convene artists, advocates, and media makers in New York City for conversation and collaboration on the power of arts, culture, and media activities in promoting the dignity and human rights of immigrants in the United States. What do these two events have to do with each other and the broader fight for equality in America? Everything.
Giving equal respect to the stories and voices of all who live here is an essential democratic value and critical to expanding opportunity in America. Since 2006, Ugly Betty (starring actress America Ferrera) has confronted such hot-button subjects as body image, gay teenagers, and, notably, illegal immigration without becoming expressly political or polarizing. When the first season revealed that Betty’s father, Ignacio Suarez (Tony Plana), was undocumented and could be deported, the show received both cheers and jeers for touching such a sensitive issue at the height of the immigration debate during the Bush administration.
A true shift in consciousness can only come when people begin to see the world not as it is, but as it should be. While advocates can provide powerful arguments and compelling data, it is artists and media makers who create a window into the possible.
To truly move hearts and minds, artists, advocates, and media makers must collaborate deeply, developing a shared vision and a coordinated set of strategies for achieving it.
It was with this in mind that The Opportunity Agenda launched our Arts + Culture Initiative. The hope is to create a space for collaboration, strengthening the work of advocates and allowing artists and media makers to make an impact on the issues that matter to them. Designed to move the social justice movement towards greater innovation, the Initiative serves as a catalyst for inspiration and action, incubating new ideas, relationships, and opportunities to move beyond traditional modes of organizing and activating constituencies.
The following anecdote, from the movie Conspiracy, seems apt for the end of the health reform fight. The abusive father is a nice substitute for extended electoral or legislative fights, such as health reform:
Lange: What was that story he told you?
Heydrich: Story?
Lange: Kritzinger.
Heydrich: Yes, he told me a story about a man he had known all his life, a boyhood friend. This man hated his father. Loved his mother fiercely. His mother was devoted to him, but his father used to beat him, demeaned him, disenherited him. Anyway, this friend grew to manhood and was still in his thirties when the mother died. The mother, who had nurtured and protected him, died. The man stood at her grave as they lowered the coffin, and tried to cry, but no tears came. The man's father lived to a very extended old age, and withered away and died when the son was in his fifties. At the father's funeral, much to the son's surprise, he could not control his tears. Wailed, sobbed, and was apparently inconsolable. Lost. That was the story Kritzinger told me.
Eichmann: I don't understand.
Heydrich: No? The man had been driven his whole life by hatred of his father. When his mother died, that was a loss, but when the father died and hatred had lost its object, the man's life was empty - over.
Lange: Interesting.
This feels about right for the love / hate relationship I felt both toward the 2009-2010 health reform fight, and the 2007-2008 Presidential campaign. The campaigns are so grueling that they feel abusive, certainly compared to the life you had before the campaign. However, at some point, the abusive, grueling nature of the campaigns becomes an end in and of itself. So, when those campaigns are over, even when you win, your life becomes emptier. A great source of pathos has been removed.
Check out the most recent issue of the journal Science which takes a look at ways to improve food security as the world's population is expected to top 9 billion by 2050. To best nourish both people and the planet, the journal suggests a rounded approach to a worldwide agricultural revolution by encouraging diets and policies that emphasize local and sustainable food production, along with the implementation of agricultural techniques that utilize biotechnology and ecologically friendly farming solutions.
Dave Pollard recently engaged in a conversation on the cult of individualism that's destroying the world, or more more specifically, that's allowing industrial systems to destroy the world. It's good, and you should go read the whole thing. Though I wanted to particularly respond to this point about the tension between the need in our current situation to take collective action and build more cohesive communities and the natural desire to develop an individual identity:
... I think we can be altruistic and collectivist and part-of-all-life-on-Earth while still being "nobody but ourselves". But because we confuse the need to struggle against the loss of our individuality due to cultural indoctrination (a good struggle), with the need to struggle against all government and all collective and cooperative and collaborative work (a bad struggle), we get it exactly backwards: Instead of becoming 'nobody-but-ourselves' we become 'ourselves apart from everybody'.
It takes great self-knowledge and self-confidence, I think, to be truly yourself and think critically, while also committing yourself absolutely to optimizing the collective well-being of the community. ...
I'd guess at least part of the problem is the way our current events storytelling so often focuses on one person's vision and motivation either bringing about great projects (usually wealth) or, after having created great wealth, a brave and filthy rich philanthropist setting out to change the world for the better. This is what's held up for emulation. One brilliant, managerial mind is the thing to look for to solve a crisis; find that and the problems almost solve themselves.
On the Meet The Press yesterday, David Brooks reminded us all just how completely loaded with bullshit most cultural criticism actually is in America:
MR. BROOKS: I always look at passionate outsiders. Who are the passionate outsiders who are going to come into the mainstream? Because the people with passion really can control the decade--the feminists in the 1970s, the evangelicals in the 1980s. And so when I look around the world at who are the real passionate outsiders, one, the people that we've already talked about, which are the, the democracy protesters in Iran. But two, and I have to say that I'm not a huge fan of them, but the tea party people. They have real passion. They're now at the outside. If they can merge with responsible leadership and become a real movement--there's real disgust at government, there's real disgust about fiscal issues--they could become maybe a destructive force in the Republican Party, maybe a positive force. But, to me, those are the people with real passion who may play a much larger role in the coming decade and so forth.
WTF does any of this actually mean? Define "passionate." Define "outsiders." For that matter, define "mainstream." And, while you are at it Mr. Brooks, please provide some justification for how any single group "controls" a decade, and what causality mechanism allows a qualitative group to do this.
Everything Brooks says here is purely bullshit masquerading as knowledge. It reminds me of why I like to ground my writing in actual facts, rather than subjective, vague, qualitative terminology that doesn't actually mean anything.
To that end, here are some things that are actually going to happen over the next decade:
1. Continuing, gradual identity changes The people of the United States are going to become:
Higher voter turnout rates (due to aging population)
Higher public spending as a % of GDP (partially due to older population, largely because that never really drops)
More tolerant (because, generally speaking, more tolerant people tend to be younger)
Equal, or greater, overall income inequality (because that has been happening for so long, and current policies will only slow the trend, not reverse it.) However, economic inequality between ethnic and gender groups will probably continue to decline.
The European Union will continue to pull away from the United States as the #1 economic region in the world. While China will not catch up to the USA, they will firmly establish themselves as a third world Superpower in this regard. These three Superpowers will dominate the world for decades.
Even as China and the EU gain on the United States economically, and even as the rest of the world gains on all three of those regions in terms of population, the Anglophone world will become an increasingly larger percentage of the wealthy world. This is because per capita income in China remains very low, and because Australia, Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom all sport population growth rates far exceeding Japan and Western Europe.
The world will get hotter.
That's all stuff that is actually going to happen. After a month of maddeningly vague and meaningless predictions of the sort quoted above, I thought this would provide a useful counterweight.
After a decade-long slide into semi-irrelevance, it's now being announced that the major television broadcast networks are considering leaving behind the "free TV/advertiser supported" business model in order to turn themselves into something more closely resembling a cable operation; the idea being that they could create a second revenue stream from the same "subscriber fees" that are paid by cable and satellite operators to all the other channels those operators carry.
This has become necessary, according to the networks, partly because the market has become so fragmented...which, naturally, is cable's fault-and presumably the fault of the disloyal viewer, as well.
Another reason driving the change is related to the desire of the networks to have a source of revenue that's more reliable in times of economic downturn, when advertisers often try to husband scarce resources by cutting back on all their expenses, particularly advertising dollars.
Will this new change in the business model reverse the fortunes of the networks?
Is it possible that the networks are simply poor business managers?
And what about...Krystal Carey?
Tune in for the rest of the story-and we'll find out.
Let's face it--from a political, economic and ecological perspective, this past decade pretty much sucked ass. Lots of war, lots of economic downturn, lots of legislative failure and the continued onset of a new, ecological, Malthusian trap. Still, looking at the decade from the grand perspective of human history, there was also a huge positive: the continued development and expansion of the Internet.
The Internet is a disruptive technology for our entire species, even if it has a long way to go before it spreads to all humans. The exponential decline in the cost of information brought about by the Internet and mobile phone technology will be, in all likelihood, the top cultural and technological development of our lifetimes. The way this has changed, and will continue to change, our economic, social and mental structures puts it on par with the printing press as an agent of change. The development of the Internet will also be America's greatest national achievement, and that is saying quite a lot given that we landed on the moon and won some pretty important wars.
Protecting the information distributed on the Internet from control by telecoms is also perhaps the greatest achievement of the Obama administration to date. In October, the President Obama's newly appointed FCC commissioners moved to start a rule-making process on Net Neutrality. Essentially, this means that the telecoms which provide access to the Internet access cannot control, or otherwise discriminate against, what information is produced, consumed and distributed on the Internet.
This happened in spite of a massive astroturf push by telecom companies, and also a letter sent to the FCC by 72 Democratic members of Congress--many of whom are in the Congressional Progressive Caucus--repeating industry talking points about how there is no need for regulation. Because really, if there is anyone you can trust to look out for your interests, large telecom companies are it. Why would anyone think that they would try and take control of content distribution for the largest cultural medium ever created? Leave Comcast and AT&T allllloooonnne.
To the FCC's credit, they moved forward on Net Neutrality anyway. It is very heartening to see the Obama administration stand up for the public interest, even if it means opposing a few dozen Congressional Democrats.
This was the first clear cut time that the Obama administration stood up for the public against corporate Democrats, instead of siding with them and coddling them. Further, in doing this the Obama administration moved the United States toward a more progressive Internet policy than most other wealthy democracies, which is something of a rarity for our country.
The continued expansion of the Internet (including wireless phones) is my pick for the top development of the decade. The Obama administration's protection of that Internet--particularly because the administration did it in the face of a bi-partisan and transnational corporate coalition--is my pick the top political moment of the first year. What are you picks?
A Chris Bowers Golden Oldie
From Mon May 05, 2008. Original HERE.
Is there a progressive movement? This question has seemed particularly relevant over the last two weeks, as support for Barack Obama has washed away apparent long-standing principles of the movement: do not legitimize Fox News and Democrats should become more partisan. Now, apparently, we need to go on Fox News as much as possible and we much ditch partisanship altogether. If the Obama campaign can change the principles of the movement so quickly, perhaps there isn't a movement at all.
Perhaps a different question is necessary: what is a political movement, anyway? Thinking back over the 20th century, the defining characteristic seems to be a large-scale political undertaking that not only had goals of changing governmental institutions, but that changed the way people lived by shifting the balance of power in other major institutions as well. A political movement seeks to reorganize society on a far broader level than simply changing governmental policy. Examples include:
The labor movement fundamentally changed the economic structure of this and other countries by granting wage-laborers more power over the American workplace.
In addition to expanding access to government, the civil right's movement sought to reorganize educational, housing and employment patterns throughout the country. Other examples from this time period include the Black Panthers and the "counter-culture," which were primarily organized around institutions other than governmental policy (law enforcement and cultural consumption).
Radical Islamicist movements have worked to reorganize virtually every major institution in a given society, from education to religion to familial structures to cultural consumption.
A political movement always targets more than governmental policy change, since only changing policy would not alter the general framework of how people live in a given society. With that in mind, in what ways is the contemporary progressive movement going beyond seeking governmental policy change, and directly altering the way people interact with other major institutions in our society?
Looking over the major ideological institutions in America--the family, education, mass media, religion, and the workplace--the largest and most rapid changes are currently taking place in the latter three. By lowering the cost of information, the Internet has dramatically changed both the media landscape specifically and cultural production / consumption patterns more generally. Also, in terms of religion, nationally there is a broad movement away from self-identification as Christian, and even a dramatic re-organization within Christianity itself. Within the workplace and our larger economic structures, the rise of the Creative Class has had a major impact on the types of jobs available in America, and also on income inequality. This isn't to say that there are not major changes in other major ideological institutions like education and the family, just that the changes in the above three are far more pronounced in recent years.
Now, which of these three major changes can be identified a part of a "progressive movement?" The religious shifts don't really work, since the movement away from traditional religious identification and institutions is not organized by any group of people, and is simply happening on its own. Since it is at least partially a side-effect of a rising corporate power, income inequality, and de-industrialization, the rise of the Creative Class doesn't really work, whether or not most members of the Creative Class tend to be progressive. This leaves us with the lower cost of information, and resulting explosion in cultural production, brought on by the Internet. Perhaps the de-centralization of mass media consumption, the public sphere interaction, and cultural production brought on by the Internet is the progressive movement. It is the clearest example of how daily life has changed in a progressive way over the last decade. The medium is the movement.
Identifying the medium, and the changing cultural and media consumption / production patterns it has created, as the progressive movement itself helps provide perspective both on Barack Obama and on policy priorities for maintaining a healthy movement. First, changing viewpoints that Obama's campaign has created about Fox News and partisanship will not be isolated incidents. Since the consumption and production patterns themselves are the major change, the movement is ultimately lacking in fixed precepts. We should expect other changes in the future, including an inevitable rejection of Obama's ideas on partisanship and Fox News. Second, in order to maintain a healthy movement and the positive feedback loops the movement creates for progressivism, telecom policy and net neutrality should be understood as top, non-negotiable policy priorities. If net neutrality is ended, then the contemporary progressive movement, along with all progressive policy and lifestyle changes it promises, will come to an end. The movement is not just dependant upon the medium, but is in fact embedded in it. If net neutrality is ended, it will shift control of the medium away from individuals with broadband access, and toward large corporations. If the movement is the medium, then control over the medium for the average Internet user must be maintained, and expanded, at all costs.
Finally, from a "medium is the movement" perspective, the choice between Clinton and Obama isn't really even a choice at all. It's Obama by a mile.
(* With 10% of the country following some form of vegetarian diet, this number is based on the assumption that vegetarians break Democratic 3-1, which is a margin very similar to the LGBT community, non-Christians, and not "white non-Hispanic."
Also note: Women are also disproportionately Democratic. However, unlike all the other groups listed here, women make up a significant percentage of Republican voters, too.)
Even though there is some overlap between these categories, the vast majority of Democrats fall into at least one of these five. And by "vast majority," I mean "over 70%."
Now, of course there is still a not-insignificant straight, meat-eating, non-union, white Christian contingent within the Democratic Party rank and file. However, that group is older than the rest of the party, and as such continues to shrink as an overall percentage of Democratic voters. Non-whites, non-Christians, LGBTs and vegetarians are all disproportionately under the age of 50, which will make future incarnations of the Democratic Party even more skewed toward these groups. This process is accelerated even further by Republicans targeting their messaging, and making the vast majority of their gains, among Americans who do not fit into one of those five categories.
I write--or at least attempt to write this--in a value-neutral sense. It isn't good or bad, it is just who the Democratic Party is at this point. It is significantly not-"white non-Hispanic," and the "white non-Hispanic" segment is significantly vegetarian, non-Christian or non-straight. Among Democratic voters who fit into neither of these groups, it is significantly union. Further, demographic and political trends will only make this more so in the future. The end result will be a Democratic Party that looks much more like that Congressional Progressive Caucus, and a Republican Party that includes the Blue Dogs and Conservadems.
During a three-hour tirade about Attorney General Eric Holder's decision to transfer five detainees from Guantanamo Bay to the United States for criminal prosecution, Rush Limbaugh attacked the "dangerous" "ideologue" Rep. Joe Sestak (D-PA), who in a Fox News interview that day discussed his support of Holder's decision.
--If Democrats do lose a significant number of House seats in 2010, the chamber as a whole will shift to the right. However, given who will lose, the Democratic caucus will actually shift significantly to the left.
--Yey, there is lots of water on the Moon! That's great and all, but if you want something that will really excite you about potential human colonization of space, check out the new VASIMR rocket--it can travel to Mars in only 39 days! Best of all, it was actually designed to ferry people and goods back and forth to a permanent Moon base, and is already being tested on the international space station. The pieces are really falling into place...
--New Stargate Universe tonight-and the premier of the Prisoner on Sunday. Woo-hoo
STATE BLOGS
In Anamaase, Ghana, the New Frontier Farmers and Processor group is led by the village's chief. Osbararima Mana Tibi II is a self described "young leader (he's 50 years old) with a love for the environment." He took it upon himself when he became chief, he says, to help revive farmland and improve the lives of the farmers in his village of about 5,000 people. And the chief is also helping farmers become more business-oriented. "We're always thinking about how to process the crops we're growing," he says. According to him, farmers don't have a lot of bargaining power in most villages in Ghana, but "processing gives them more leverage.
The group is doing some of its own community-based research by testing the effect moringa has on livestock. According to their research, feeding sheep moringa leaves has reduced fat in the meat dramatically, "making it taste more like bushmeat," and it lasts longer when it is preserved than regular mutton. They've also found that goats who eat moringa are healthier.
