ASSAR Ghana participates in SAG-SEED Replicator Connect Workshop

By Rahinatu Sidiki Alare and Prince Ansah

A one-day workshop on developing eco-inclusive projects brought together about 25 participants from across Ghana, including two ASSAR Ghana team members, in the city of Kumasi on 12 October 2017.

The SAG-SEED Replicator Connect Workshop is aimed at building the capacities of participants on eco-inclusive business models that provide proven solutions to sustainability challenges in various geographic locations. The sector focus of this workshop was on i) agricultural product processing and ii) beekeeping.

Participants were introduced to basic business concepts, developing business ideas, and the essence of adapting business models to suit local context rather than copying existing business models. Practical sessions were also held where participants were grouped into beekeeping and agricultural product processing groups to develop business ideas, potential customers and empathy maps, context-specific business models, visual prototyping as well as a lean enterprise blueprint for the proposed businesses.

Rahina Sidiki Alare and other group members developing a customer empathy map of their proposed businesses.

Prince Ansah and Rahina Sidiki Alare from the ASSAR Ghana team were present to explore opportunities for collaborations and possibilities of integrating these models into the ASSAR upcoming capacity building workshops, including Grants for Local Adaptation Strategy (GLAS) and the Scenario-Based Capacity Building (SBCB). Also present was Eric Kaliebo, a TSP reference group member from the Lawra District of the Upper West Region, whose capacity was built on beekeeping and its business potentials.

Insights from this workshop are also important for ASSAR Ghana as it provides practical solutions to addressing food security and livelihood empowerment issues at the local level. This creates the opportunity to further advance the Post-TSP action areas and prioritise for the upcoming capacity building workshops in Ghana.

Visual prototype of a business from one of the group exercises.

The SEED Replicator Connect Workshop was implemented under the Switch–Africa Green Project with support from the European Union, United Nation Environment (UNE), United Nation Development Programme (UNDP) and United Nations for Project Services (UNOPS). The workshop was facilitated by Regina Hammond and Ebenezer Kumi.

The ASSAR team engaged the facilitators of the event to explore future collaborations for local agriculture and beekeeping enterprises at the local level in Upper West Region.