My name is Pastor Nana Kweku Mensah. I am now a Catechist of the Adenta Methodist Church in Accra. I am blessed with a wife and four children: 3 boys and one girl namely Joseph, Justice, Noah and Rosemary. I am the bread winner of my family and 5 other children who live with me from my wife’s and my extended family.

You may be asking yourself, how much does a Methodist catechist earn (besides blessings from Jesus) for me to be able to fend and cater for this battalion.

The Lord’s way of assisting me to care for my family is through the Blessing of the MORE system. Gal 6:7b says that “whatever a man sows, so shall he reap”. I sow using the MORE techniques I learned through the kindness of my sponsors from Perpetual Prosperity Pumps Foundation, so my rabbits multiply so fast, so does my chicken. Joseph and Justice love to feed the rabbits. In the minor rainy season, I sold $20 (equivalent) worth of okra every three days for over six weeks. That was how the whole family was sustained during the period.

You will wonder, what is unique about the MORE system. I say, it is the integration of the profit centers. One of the components is always giving you income: if it is not mushrooms, it is cucumber, or cabbages, or chicken. I write hereby to express heartfelt thanks to my sponsors. May the Good Lord bless the founders and leaders of PPPF. May your prosperity never see an end just like mine.

Pastor Nana Kwaku Mensah

My name is Yaa Adoma. I am the mother of the Yaa Adoma Family. My family is one of the first 10 selected and sponsored to receive training and set up in the MORE system. None of my grandparents as well as my parents went to school. I never went beyond class 6 either. My parents and grandparents were all farmers and so am I. So you can imagine my joy when I was selected to receive training in the MORE system.

I told my colleagues that the name MORE sounds good to me, so whatever the name meant, it will be good and lo and behold, it is good.

Before I received sponsorship from PPPF my farm was mainly consisted of cassava, plantain, cocoyam, and corn. After I received the training and support, now I farm tomatoes, garden eggs, ‘abedru’, pepper, cabbage, etc. I also have chicken, mushrooms, and rabbits. This year, I am going to prune my own trees for firewood and plant more.

My colleague farmers ask me always “adEn na wo deE wo ho nkyere wo da yi?” ‘why do you always look like you are not in any hardship at all’? I tell them that, the secret is MORE- the integrated prosperity farm. The most wonderful of all is that, even though I never went beyond class six, I now can and will take care of my children’s education until at least one completes university.

I am very grateful to my sponsors SPY Aquatics/ Gotta Run and PPPF for this wonderful experience; and especially for the shoes given to my family. My kids are still wearing them to school after two years. My house address is E28, Essienimpong. I am happy to show everybody my farm.

Thank you very much,

Nana Yaa Adoma for Yaa Adoma Family

My name is Emmanuel Klutse. I was selected to represent the Klutse Family which consist of my aunt and three sisters, Wendy, Rahel and Stella. I am an Ewe from the Volta Region. Ewe‘s are patrilineal, so when my father died, my father‘s sister, Aunt Janet has taken care of me since I was five years old.

I am very grateful to PPPF for supporting me to receive training in the MORE system at KITA. As a result of the training, I‘ve been able to raise my own organic vegetables for sale to support my Auntie in taking care of my sibblings. I also raise tree seedlings for sale especially moringa.

I also received training in small business management, personal financial managment, leadership, marketing and banking skills w

hich has enabled me to manage my farm effectively as a business.

Through the support from PPPF I have set up a farm to support my family with year round vegetables and food. I have also set up one Future farmers club in my area that I teach the MORE practical agricultural skills to young junior high school pupils in my locality.

My family wish to say we can never thank our sponsors enough.

Thank you, PPPF.

Emmanuel Klutse

2 sisters Wendi and Rahel holding moringa seedlings – each sell for $2.50 equivalent

My Aunt Jane and the 2 sisters in the farm with the PPPF bicycle

Me and the FFG club

The other FFG club members

At the peak of one of the worst dry seasons in Ghana and Sub Saharan Africa, PPPF’s adopted family, Mohammed Manshur (25 years), reaps abundance of okra and tomatoes and makes hundreds of Cedis from a lush farm to the surprise of many farmers in his area.

Mr. Mohammed Mansur (holding three okras up-left) is the family representative of the Manshur Family adopted by Magothy River Middle School of Maryland in 2008. Mohammed was sponsored by Magothy River middle school to receive training in the MORE system, and to receive start-up materials to set up his own MORE Farm. Mohammed is now teaching the MORE principles to students in Tamale Polytechnic and also managing his own MORE farms.

According to the Agricultural extension officer in charge of the area, Mr. Fuseini Musah, the fresh state of Mohammed’s farm baffles all farmers and extension officers in the area. According to Mr. Fuseini this dry season has been one of the worst in Ghana with temperatures of 41 to 42 degrees and 26 to 27 degrees Celsius in the afternoons and nights respectively. Most shrubs and legumes have completely dried up. To him it is pretty amazing to have such a fresh farm in the middle of nowhere in the Northern Region where there is deep concern about how fast the Sahara desert is approaching.

According to Mr. K. Atobiga a neighboring farmer, Mohammed is not doing anything completely different from what all other farmers are doing, yet his farm is completely out of the ordinary. “When we ask Mohammed his secret, he just say ‘it’s the MORE magic’. We say, then come and perform the MORE magic in our farms so we can also have more”. “We all want to go to Kumasi (where Mohammed got his magic) to learn the MORE magic”.”Mohammed says next dry season he will walk us step by step through the MORE practices so we can have many farms”.

With an infectious smile and pointing to a wad of cash in his pocket, Mohammed observed “the market women chase me in town to give me deposits for my produce. Since when did farmers become so important that market women bring gifts to their farms to lobby to be allowed to buy produce? I and my family are so blessed.

“The best thing that ever happened to me in my life is the MORE training I received in Kumasi. I am so grateful to Magothy River Middle School for sponsoring me.” When we asked Mohammed, what is so unique about the MORE practices he responded with another wide smile and said “maybe site
selection, or planting distances, or the way the cow dung was mixed into the soil, or the water conservation practices, or the seed selection, or a combination of all, I can’t be sure. What I can say is that the MORE training taught me to have a good relationship with my plants. I observe their mood and as much as I can, I give them their needs”.

When we asked Mohammed, where he gets his water from, he observed that he dug about 5 feet deep into a dried river bed and he located his Miracle Pump there. He paddles the water into a 55gallon drum. A long ¾” pipe connects the drum to the farm. Interestingly the soil retains lots of the water for the plants so I don’t need to water that often.

Mohammed counts 3 to 5 okras for 50pesewas. He hopes to make more than 3500 Cedis (about 3000$) from this ¾ acre okra farm. This is my after school project. I come here after school with Muktar who is in class 6.” Mohammed’s younger brother Muktar, (insert in the first page holding a basket of tomatoes) learning after his brother also harvest that much tomatoes from his small farm every 3 days.

My name is Ben Apedo. I represent the Apedo family sponsored by the Annapolis Striders. I have five siblings. When I was selected by PPPF to receive training and set-up support in the MORE system, I was so grateful. My initial vegetable farm during my training consisted of 30 beds which were 4 feet by 16 feet each (see picture 1 below). I raised so much vegetables that I made almost $830 equivalent from these beds. Without the MORE training, I wouldn’t have made even $300 from all the 30 beds.

My entire life has changed because of the knowledge and skills I received through the kind sponsorship of Annapolis Striders and Perpetual Prosperity Pumps Foundation. Today, I have completed my National Service and I am now teaching what I learnt to young female farmers at the Women’s Training Institute at Bechem in the Brong Ahafo Region. This December 09, I intend to lead the school to win a Best Farmer Award. My own farm is thriving so well with various combinations of goats and tree crops, vegetables and rabbits, and so much corn.

I and my family are so grateful to my sponsors. My hope is that MORE young Ghanaians and families will receive the training in the MORE system all across Africa.

-Ben Apedo representing the Apedo Family