Digital Literacy Training For Women Farmers

On Wednesday, 16th of September 2020, Soronko Academy hosted a training session on digital literacy for women farmers in collaboration with Network For Women’s Rights In Ghana(NETRIGHT). A total of 20 women were in attendance.

The project manager of Soronko Academy, Miss Delphina Agyare, welcomed the women into the academy and introduced Mr Cyril Agbewali as the lead trainer for the day. Mr Agbewali began with an ice breaker activity called 2 Truths,1 Lie. The women were asked to write down two truths and a lie about themselves, after which they picked at random to read out loud and identify who it belonged to.

After this, the women were taken through mobile photography and videography by Mr Jerry Aidoo, the media officer at Soronko Academy. He described mobile photography as the act of capturing images on a mobile device. He went on to discuss 3 basic features to look out for when purchasing a mobile device for picture taking purposes. The first feature he mentioned was Megapixels (Resolutions). The resolution or detail of an image is determined by the number of megapixels of the camera. A picture taken with a 5MP camera will not have as much detail as one taken with a 20MP camera. It’s a good start to find out the number of megapixels your device has before purchasing.

The second feature was Image/Video Stabilization. This feature is becoming common in most high-end mobile devices, image stabilization gives you very steady and sharp photos, this feature would also give great video movement without you needing to be a pro. The third feature was HDR/Zoom (Software Addons). It is good to look out for camera’s that also have good zoom and High definition (HDR) capabilities as they could also greatly improve your photos.

Mr Aidoo’s next topic was Creating a visual identity for your product or brand. He spoke about product presentation, knowing your target audience, messaging, understanding your brand elements and how to use them. He stated that every product or business should have a unique way to communicate its presence and engage an audience. He gave an example of a physical product such as jewellery. This would have to represented in a way that shows the most unique parts of the jewellery and also how it would look when worn. This helps your potential client imagine how it would look, he added.

A practical session of taking pictures was followed after this. The trainer aided the women in applying the few tips he had given on mobile photography into practice. The women were eager to show their photography skills at this point as they now acknowledged the importance of a good picture for a product or a brand. Mr Aidoo displayed a short video on how to photograph their farm produce and also took them through a few photo editing apps they could use to edit their pictures and images as well. The class went on an hour lunch break after this.

Mr Agbewali, the lead trainer for the day, took over after the break. He spoke on two Social Media platforms (Facebook & Whatsapp). He began by showing the women how to create a Facebook account and page for their businesses. He gave insights on how the women could use the social media platform to their advantage. Facebook goes beyond posting pictures and liking them, there are countless things you could do there, Mr Agbewali stated. He also showed them how they could gain attention to their pages.

He then also took the ladies through the tools and interfaces of Whatsapp for business. He assisted the women in setting up their accounts also. The next was how to use Mobile money to track their expenditure and requesting a statement on the account. Miss Delphina Aggyare, Project Manager of Soronko Academy, presented certificates of completion to the participants after their training and she encouraged the women to continue to apply what they had learnt from the academy in their daily lives from henceforth. They took a group picture with their newly acquired certificates to crown up the day.