Through a couple of meetings with the supervisors of our project, HortiTerra, the reason behind our internship became clear; we have to deliver a business plan for a greenhouse company in Kumasi, Ghana. For this business plan, a design of the greenhouse is essential. A lot of the information needed for this design could, and is, investigated in the Netherlands. In the first instance, there was an idea to build the structure of the greenhouse with wood. By now, the focus of the construction material is on bamboo. Some companies which are related to bamboo are approached and are willing to help. Bamboo seems to be a perfect building material for the greenhouse.
Next to the design opportunities, it is important to know about the Ghanaian culture. The courses of the minor did provide to this research in a general way. What are some main cultural differences between the Netherlands and most of the African countries. To get to know more about these differences, we went to an intervention for African migrants in the Hague. This visit made clear the impact of these differences, which was bigger than expected.
Because this project is about setting up a farming business in Africa, it was considered useful to go to the 2SCALE conference 'Food for thought: Made in Africa, for Africa!' This assumption was correct and the day planted some thoughts which will be very useful later on. Next to seven speeches of successful African entrepreneurs, there was the opportunity to go in discussion at roundtables. The group joined the roundtables which were thinking about 'Farming as a business', 'Youth employment' and 'The advantages of an inclusive business'. All discussions were useful in two ways; the conducted discussions were inspiring and our project was inspired by others, which resulted in valuable contacts.