Ahkom Lei farm

[From David Sandi]

2nd harvest from the casava garden at the Lei farm.

The heartwarming aspect of this exercise is the chance to mix with and provide impoverished villagers (both young and old, school children and non-school going children) much needed cash for their services. From rooting to totting the bags of casava out to the line where we may be lucky to hire space on a passing timber, cattle or market truck for transport to Koidu.

The first harvest totalled 9 bags. This second harvest yielded 25 bags. Not counting what we gave away. There is one, maybe two more harvests before the plot is exhausted. We planted on approximately 3 quarters of an acre of bole land. There is 25 acres of bole land in total. There’s also ample space on the upland for casava planting.

When casava is scarce it can fetch up to le500,000 a bag. That’s one whole term school fee for a disadvantaged child. Currently with plenty of on-going harvests, a full bag fetches le250,000. Down the line, with value-added processing using a portable casava grating machine, casava can be grated and dried into “garri”. A bag of garri retails at le1,500,000.