News

June 2011: Liberia Update
Under LIFE Phase II, ACDI/VOCA established an office in Zwedru and deployed eight field facilitators to three new counties: Grand Gedeh, River Gee and Gbarpolu.

Other activities included

• 164 smallholder cocoa farmers participated in LIFE II introductory meetings in Grand Gedeh and River Gee counties.
• 500 smallholder cocoa farmers involved in crop diversification, including 150 women, participated in Farming as a Business refresher training.
• 267 members from four value savings and loan clubs generated $1,119. $433 were shared among members, $106 were used as social funds and $580 were loaned to members.

April 2011: Liberia Update
ACDI/VOCA secured a commitment from Ecobank to pilot loans with up to three LIFE-sponsored farmers’ associations for the 2011-12 cocoa season. These will be the first post-war loans by a financial institution to farmer’s associations in Liberia.

The LIFE program sponsored an International Women’s Day event in which 450 women from LIFE-sponsored associations participated and exhibited cocoa products made in the country, including roasted cocoa nibs, organic soap, crystals/bicarbonate soda distilled from ground cocoa shells, and tie-dyed clothes made with black and yellow dye from ground cocoa shells.

ACDI/VOCA facilitated a two-day Cocoa Market Linkage Forum from March 17-18 in Gbarnga, Bong County, which brought together more than 80 stakeholders from government, farmer organizations, exporters, financial institutions and other private sector partners actively involved in the cocoa sector and value chain.

Three LIFE-sponsored farmers’ associations received "Best Cocoa Quality Practices" awards, which included cocoa-grading equipment and certificates of acknowledgement, through a Christmas donation of $5,000 from Transmar Commodity Group Ltd.

December 2010: Liberia Update
By October, 10 SUCCESS Alliance-supported farmers' associations bulked and sold 36 MT of cocoa beans (27 percent Grade 1, 63 percent Grade 2, and 10 percent Sub-Grade) for $58,864 at the average farmgate price of $1,650/MT.

Sixteen LIFE-supported village savings and loan clubs with a core membership of 527 have raised $5,142

ACDI/VOCA partnered with Sea+Land Traders International, a cocoa exporter, to facilitate and sponsor a one-day cocoa quality orientation seminar for three LIFE subgrantees and four crop diversification facilitators at their Monrovia warehouse.

In October, LIFE provided 108 smallholder cocoa farms with technical assistance in harvesting and post-harvest handling, including proper and timely harvesting, fermentation, drying and sorting techniques. Twenty-nine farmers received technical assistance in rehabilitating a total of 109 acres of their cocoa farms.

Twelve Farming as a Business clubs comprised of 391 farmers engaged in vegetable production and sold assorted vegetables for $18,174. This marks the first time small-scale farmers in these communities have realized such an impressive amount.

Forty-plus farmer representatives from two associations received refresher training in farm recordkeeping in Lofa County.

SUCCESS Alliance provided close to 200 cocoa farmers technical assistance in cocoa bulking, recordkeeping and Farming as a Business club development.

October 2010: Liberia Media Coverage
Daily Observer: "West Africa Cocoa" Boost"

July 2010: Liberia Update
ACDI/VOCA organized and conducted a farmers’ market workshop on practical selling skills for over 27 participant farmers from Nimba, Bong and Montserrado counties. Following the workshop, farmers organized a farmers’ market sponsored and hosted by the American Embassy. The market served as a lucrative market outlet for small-scale and beginner commercial farmers to buy and sell high-value vegetables, fruits and herbs.

From July 12-13, ACDI/VOCA organized and successfully hosted a two-day cocoa market linkage forum in Gbarnga City, Bong County, bringing together 75 major actors in the cocoa supply chain.

Ten newly formed ACDI/VOCA-supported savings and loan clubs reported generating L$37,575 (US$537) through shares and social funds contribution with 8.3 percent of this amount going to social funds and 66 percent being loaned to members and farmers in their respective communities.

ACDI/VOCA’s LIFE credit specialist held a series of meetings with two main commercial banks to work on the modality of loan opportunities for LIFE-sponsored farmers’ associations.

June 2010 : Liberia Update
SUCCESS Alliance staff provided technical assistance in cocoa farm rehabilitation to 6 cocoa farmers in Lofa and Nimba counties, which resulted in the underbrushing of 50 acres of cocoa. Staff assisted 10 cocoa farmers with the nursery management and transplating of 2,000 cabbage and hot chili pepper seedlings. Staff also supported 15 project-sponsored cocoa farmers’ associations in amending their bylaws and constitutions to be consistent with the Cooperative Development Agency's guidelines.

May 2010 : Liberia Update
Approximately 928 project-sponsored farmers transplanted 179,230 seedlings to their farms, replacing old cocoa trees and expanding their farms. Twenty cocoa farmers conducted trainings in Farming as a Business principles for 219 cocoa farmers in their community. Eight newly established village savings and loan clubs with a core membership of 270 reported raising L$131,995 (US$1,885.65), out of which they have lent L$78,780 (US$1,125.43) to members for uses including pre-financing purchases of members’ cocoa and purchasing horticultural inputs.

January 2010 : Liberia Update
In January, the bylaws and constitutions for four emerging farmers’ associations supported by ACDI/VOCA’s Livelihood Improvement for Farming Enterprises (LIFE) program in Sanoyea, Foya and Quadu Bondi were completed and adopted by the general membership. The process to legalize the associations with local authorities has begun.

Also, 897 participants from 30 new farmer field schools (FFS) in the new operational areas of Bong and Lofa Counties completed construction on 39 cocoa nurseries. In Bong and Lofa, a total of 190,015 cocoa seeds were supplied by STCP in FFS communities to cocoa farmers.

September 2009: Liberia Update
Four solar dryers, the first of this type ever in Liberia, were successfully constructed. Additionally, LIFE provided four fermentation boxes to project-sponsored farmers' associations in Nimba County. LIFE will construct a total of 10 solar dryers and provide 10 mini-fermentation boxes for 10 project-sponsored farmers' associations in Bong, Nimba and Lofa counties, in order to begin increasing quality management during post-harvest handling.

LIFE conducted two Farming as a Business (FaaB) trainings for 52 participants. LIFE also provided technical assistance in correct recordkeeping methodology to seven cocoa farmers in two communities of Bong County

On July 10, the USDA Assistant Agricultural Attaché Levin S. Flake and two U.S. Embassy economic officers, Sarah G. Gonzales and Rebecca Halper, traveled to LIFE project sites in Sanoyea District. They saw cocoa nursery sites and cocoa farms and visited with project-sponsored farmers.

July 2009: Liberia Update
Eight farmers associations’ communities have established Farming as a Business (FaaB) clubs for a total of 140 members (39 males and 101 females). As part of that total, 71 of the women have organized themselves into female-led FaaB clubs in the towns of Madala and Wolamai in Lofa County.

Under the crop diversification initiative, 20 cocoa farmers have harvested and sold almost $700 worth of hot peppers and peanuts to augment their income.

March 2009: Liberia Update
Crop diversification facilitators held 25 community meetings and provided technical assistance to 271 cocoa farmers in the rehabilitation of their farms including under brushing of 55 acres of cocoa and pruning and reduction of shade trees on 3 acres. SUCCESS Alliance also distributed agroprocessing equipment donated by FAO to farmers’ associations.

February 2009: Liberia Update
As a result of training in Farming as a Business principles, approximately 1,200 farmers took the first step in the transition from subsistence to commercial farming by keeping records of their farm expenses and revenues.

June 2008: Wheeler Speaks at Liberia’s National Roundtable Conference
ACDI/VOCA-Liberia Chief of Party and Country Representative Robin Wheeler presented at the Liberia’s Second National Roundtable Conference, which was held at city hall in Monrovia June 23-25. The event brought together key actors and donors in cooperative development to discuss the future of cooperatives in Liberia and the rehabilitation of the Cooperative Development Agency (CDA).

The three-day event to rejuvenate the CDA and form ties among the stakeholders was hosted by the Liberian Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) and SOCODEVI, an international development NGO. It was themed “Creating a Conducive Environment for Cooperative Development in Liberia: the Rehabilitation of CDA and Revision of the Cooperative Law of Liberia.” Cooperative development, which is an important tool in increasing rural farmers’ incomes, was severely hampered by Liberia’s 14-year civil war, which ended in 2003. Funding for the conference was provided by the Canadian International Development Agency, USAID’s Sustainable Tree Crop Program and the MOA.

Wheeler gave the opening and closing speeches at the event, remarking upon ACDI/VOCA’s roots in cooperative development and its historical legacy in Liberia.

“It is very fitting to speak at this event considering that ACDI/VOCA grew out of the cooperative movement in the United States, is celebrating 45 years of existence this year and was instrumental in the early development of cooperatives in Liberia,” Wheeler said.

He remarked upon the important legacy left in Liberia by ACDI/VOCA’s precursor organizations, beginning in 1976 with an assessment of cooperatives in Liberia as part of the USAID-funded Development Program Grant. Other activities in the 1970s and 1980s helped to establish supply and marketing cooperatives as part of a project funded by World Bank and USAID, assisting the Cooperative Development Division of the MOA—the predecessor to the CDA—by providing advisors in cooperative management, accounting and training, and fielding volunteer consultants to provide technical assistance to the MOA, the Liberia Credit Union, the Agricultural and Cooperative Development Bank and the Liberian Development Foundation.

In February 2008, ACDI/VOCA returned to Liberia to implement the USDA-funded Livelihood Improvement for Farming Enterprises project which improves the incomes of 5,600 cocoa farmers in Bong, Nimba and Lofa counties, and the income-generation component of the USAID-funded Land Rights and Community Forestry Program which works to sustainably improve the livelihoods of populations living in forested areas of Nimba and Sinoe counties.

“Our planned activities under both of these projects, and future activities include facilitating the development of healthy, democratic cooperatives or producer organizations in the Liberian context,” Wheeler said. “Therefore, we are a major stakeholder in the development of the CDA and cooperative law here, and seek to ensure that they will foster and protect the rights of Liberian smallholder farmers who must form the backbone of a newly revitalized agricultural sector.”

A major challenge facing the MOA is the need to restructure the CDA in order to develop national priorities with governmental stakeholders and non-state actors and to revise the legal regulations related to co-ops.

Participants included Liberia Vice President Joseph Boakai, Minster of Agriculture J. Chris Toe, other top governmental officials, cooperative organizers, farmers and nongovernmental organization representatives from UNDP, FAO, UNHCR, GTZ, ACDI/VOCA, Catholic Relief Services and others.