Our Experience

This page seeks to capture the experience that we are having during our work with the Ghanaian community of Agbokpa. As we are learning in class through our readings, we are finding that the process of appropriate technology development and sustainable implementation is a continual learning process full of unexpected turns.

Struggles:

  • Patiently waiting for timely responses from our contact in Agbokpa
  • Recognizing our sheer ignorance when it comes to daily life and culture of Ghana since none of group members have been to Ghana, or to anywhere on the entire continent of Africa for that matter

Concerns:

  • Developing a feasible method to show the people of Agbokpa how beneficial renting one of our plots would be all year round to overcome any of their doubts
  • The villagers need a form of storage so they don’t have to sell everything all at once at the market.
  • Providing the village with portable water and electricity
  • Transportation for crops.
  • Fences to keep livestock out of crops.
  • Transporting equipment to the village is difficult.

Realizations:

  • In a perfect world, we’d be able to work first hand with the people of Agbokpa to better address their needs
  • We would have traveled to Agbokpa, spoke with the community members, and learned about the village before even considering what possible technological infrastructure we could work to develop within the community (we have learned how important this initial step is)