We are happy to announce that the Ngoyaï Gbaayegie farmer based organisation (FBO) in Sierra Leone is in the news again; the secretary of the FBO, Steven Lansana, is taking part as a speaker in an upcoming webinar hosted by the Innovation Forum!
The webinar – Voices from the farm: Priorities, challenges and aspirations for sustainable transformation – will host a panel of farmers, working within different supply chains discussing their visions for the future within their respective fields. In much of the debate around transforming agricultural supply chains to become more sustainable, one of the most fundamental actors within these supply chains is often forgotten: the farmers.
Taking place on the 13th of October, this webinar aims to combat that particular issue. The panellists are all farmers within their respective commodity supply chain, and will discuss the overarching topic of becoming more sustainable in the years to come. The panel will deliberate over such issues as what challenges they have previously faced and expect to in the future, their priorities for the future of their farms and families, and what is needed from larger food companies to secure their livelihoods and ensure the sustainability of their farms, among other topics.
Steven Lansana is a Sierra Leonean native, born and raised in the Pelewahun village of the Kailahun District, where he started working on his family’s oil palm farm, later expanding on these plots. In 2020, Steven was elected as the inaugural secretary for the Ngoyaï Gbaayegie FBO, which has already made history after it became the first group in Africa, and the largest, to become RSPO certified – you can read more about that here. The FBO adheres to the RSPO standard, which ensures that sustainable farming practices are implemented on the oil palm farms, therefore protecting both the environment the farmers work in and the farmers themselves.
The Innovation Forum is an organisation with the mission to help make sustainability the mainstream in business. They are a platform that facilitates debate-driven events and discussions that tackle the critical business sustainability challenges around the world, also supporting this work with online publications, analysis and research into these sustainability challenges that businesses face.
We at Planting Naturals and Goldtree S.L. are excited to see Steven on this panel and representing the Ngoyaï Gbaayegie FBO, illustrating the successes and challenges that he and the FBO have recently faced. We’re also interested to see what the other panellists from the different supply chains have to discuss and share with us, and what insights we can share with one another!
The webinar is scheduled for Thursday 13th of October – register here to join the webinar. See you then!
