Doris Tetteh was a food vendor – popularly known as a “chop bar” keeper in Ghana – for five years. In this job, she cooked local dishes for sale mostly to laborers working on building projects in the area. According to Doris, “For so many years, I operated a ‘chop bar’, but most people never paid for the food.”

Doris’ creditors took advantage of their familiarity with her and failed to pay. She could therefore not earn enough from the enterprise to support herself, four brothers, and her mother.

Doris then started cultivating corn to help provide the food needs of the family. Then USAID introduced its food security program in 1996, through the Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA), into Trom community located in the Krobo area of Ghana’s Eastern Region. The program aims at improving farmers’ household access to food, shelter, education and health.

A survey conducted in the Krobo area identified improved varieties of mango and corn as suitable crops that could help improve incomes of poor rural farmers. To participate in the program, the farmer should have a low income and access to at least two acres of land. Doris was one of the 1,000 poor farmers selected in the area.

From the proceeds, Doris has purchased a pick-up truck for delivering the fruit to processing companies and customers. She has acquired a tractor for her farming operations which is hired out to other farmers when not in use. She has also begun diversifying into livestock farming with seventeen cattle and seventy sheep and goats.

Doris is now the main supplier of fresh mangoes and mango seedlings in the Krobo area. The remarkable improvements in the living standards of Doris and other USAID-assisted farmers have encouraged other farmers and organizations to establish large acreages on their own, making the Krobo district the most important mango producing area in Ghana.