Nakpanduri (NE/R), July 18, GNA – About 600 people comprising persons with disabilities, the poor and needy, orphans and widows in the Bunkpurugu-Nakpanduri District have each been given a bag of maize to supplement their food requirements.
The 25 kg bag of maize support for each of the beneficiaries from the Bimoba, Konkomba, Fulani, Muslim, and Christian communities in the district in the North East Region became necessary as a result of food shortages being experienced in the area forcing some families to starve.
The food aid to the members of the communities was donated by Yennutoona Foundation, an organisation established by Mr Konlan Nanleeb, a native of the area, and his wife and children, which work to feed the poor and needy in the district.
During this period of each year, foods stored by the largest farming communities in the district get exhausted and families have to wait for their crops to mature to get food hence the intervention by the Yennutoona Foundation to alleviate hunger in the area.
The Yennutoona Foundation has been presenting food aid to the poor and needy in the area during this critical period for the past 41 years, and this year’s support also came with quantities of used clothes, footwear amongst others beneficiaries.
Mr Konlan Nanleeb, General Director of Yennutoona Foundation, flanked by his wife and a son, and some prominent members of the area to present the sacks of maize to the beneficiaries at a ceremony at Konchian Gberuk, a community in the district, was happy that the support would help alleviate hunger in some homes during these hard times.
He used the opportunity to emphasise the need for the people of the district, which used to be a conflict-prone area, to remain united, peaceful, and love their neighbours for the development of the area.
He said “We have been giving out to the poor for the past 41 years. Some people sleep hungry in the Bimoba area here.
So, all the maize is from my farm. I do farming a lot and this particular time of every year, we bring food for persons with disabilities, the needy, orphans, and widows who need food but this year and last year were so special because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Due to COVID-19, things did not go well for our people around this area because people could not go to the farm and the economy was down completely.”
Mr Nanleeb spoke about other interventions of the Yennutoona Foundation saying “We also bring women together and finance them to farm cashew, soybeans, maize, groundnut and also encourage them to plant trees.
So, as we stand here today, our women organisations that we support have planted over 1.1 million trees; cashew, shea nut, and dawadawa to help fight global warming as well as ensure livelihood for them.”
He said the Foundation also taught women best agronomic practices such as not using weedicides but rather organic materials such as manure and compost to make the land more fertile as well as plant trees along banks of rivers in the area adding “Due to this, we now have water in the rivers where animals drink and we now have trees growing.”
He said, “We are also introducing wildlife back to the communities and the people have received the wildlife and they are rearing them to be released into the wild.”
Mr Nanleeb expressed gratitude to especially chiefs in the area for helping to stop bush fires which were helpful to the community as new trees were now growing, saying “As we have introduced best agronomic farming practices to the women organisations, they now gain more yields to feed themselves.”
Naba Davik Kansuk, Paramount Chief of Nakpanduri described the intervention as excellent, saying it had come at the right time to support the food needs of the people.
Naba Kansuk advised the people to live in harmony and be one another’s keeper emphasising that they should desist from fighting, adding “Konkombas, Bimobas and Mamprusis are one. No more fight.”
He called on all to support the Yennutoona Foundation to continue to reach out to the poor and needy, especially in critical times when there were food shortages in the communities.
Mambora Banimbia, a beneficiary from Binde in the district, said “At this time, there is no food in this area. When we farm, we do not get enough yields because of the poor fertility level of the soil.”
She added that “So, we do not know how to cope until we harvest our crops. So, this food donation to us has come at the right time because it will sustain us for days.”
GNA