Ms. Amie Colley, a female entrepreneur who benefited from a Covid-19 relief support in the sum of US$1,200 (GMD 60,000.00), bankrolled by the Rural Poor Stimulus Facility (RPSF) through the Resilience of Organizations for Transformative Smallholder Agriculture Project (ROOTS), has utilized the funds to equip and upscale her business so as to meet the entrepreneurial demands of the industry.
After receiving the grant money, she was able to pay allowances to her two staff and purchase lots of raw and packaging materials as well as machines among other necessary things, which, she acknowledged, has boosted her production scale.
A native of Somita Village in the West Coast Region of The Gambia, Colley, who owns ‘Ami’s Vegetable Production and Food Processing’, was among the 30 selected women and youth farmers across the country, who were trained on Digital Marketing using various Social media platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp Business, Instagram and TikTok. The said training was initiated by the ROOTS Project through the Rural Poor Stimulus Facility (RPSF), and was implemented by the Global Youth Innovation Network (GYIN) Gambia Chapter.
With the knowledge garnered from that training, she was able to enlarge the scope of her enterprise by creating her own Social Media accounts to market her products online. And it pays dividends as she now manages her online platforms to attract a wider customer base.
As part of the training package, a cash grant of US$1,200, equivalent to D60,000.00, was disbursed to all the beneficiaries to support their respective businesses.
So, how did the female entrepreneur spend her funds? Hear her explanations: “This cash grant support has enabled me to start processing dry food. Before getting the grant, I used to buy materials from the market but currently, I normally go to GHE [Gambia Horticultural Enterprises Ltd.] to buy original and standard packaging materials such as nylon bags, glass bottles etc. in order to compete [with others] in the market.”
She was confident to say that her business is among the ‘most successful businesses’ in her village–thanks to the intervention of the ROOTS Project.
‘Ami’s Vegetable Production and Food Processing‘ is into catering services alongside processing of complementary baby foods, local coffee, chili pepper (capsicum) and among other fruits.
Proprietress Colley could not conclude without expressing gratitude to the benefactors. “I want to take this opportunity to express my sincere appreciation and gratitude to the ROOTS Project and GYIN Gambia for coming to our aid as SMEs [Small and medium-sized enterprises] during this pandemic,” she underlined.
Over the years, she has also benefited from a host of training programmes and supports from the National Enterprise Development Initiative (NEDI) and Social Development Fund (SDF), among other institutions.
It could be recalled that last year, Ms. Colley attended one-day training on Digital Literacy and benefitted from a three months mentoring.
