Alison M. Jones: Photo Gallery: Palm Oil Processing, Ghana

Click on the images to see more detail. All images © Alison M. Jones

IN MARCH 2001 I visited the Assin Asamankese Cooperative of Palm Oil Millers Society, sponsored by TechnoServe. One of TechnoServe’s earliest efforts was to help establish this industry in Ghana as a business solution to rural poverty. A local sign I saw explained: “Palms are probably second only to the grasses in economic importance, providing all the basic necessities of human life from food and timber to medicine and writing materials.” In Ghana more than half the people still rely on subsistence farming. The worker who’d been there the longest gave me his thumb print on my model release form; the woman who was chair of this coop called her husband “Master;” inheritance is matrilineal; and all men in this Akan region are expected to give their new wife a sewing machine as part of the dowry. — Alison M. Jones

See more about TechnoServe and other humanitarian NGOs on our NGOs page.
 

Mary Nuamah, Manager and Treasurer, with two other women preparing palm nuts.
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Mary Nuamah in traditional dress with other members.
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Mary Nuamah with palm nuts.
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Coop member with palm nuts.
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Bowl of palm oil.
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Agnes Munko with her children at Jakai D/C Junior Secondary School.
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Coop member pouring palm oil.
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Mary Nuamah with Albert Kof Essel (husband), both in traditional dress.
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Coop member with containers of palm nuts.
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