Fuveme, Ghana, used to be a thriving coastal village; after less than a decade, it’s an island, and its residents are struggling. Food for All Africa is providing the people of Fuveme with food staples to help alleviate hunger in the area.

Rising sea levels, brought on by climate change, are eroding parts of Ghana’s coastline. Located between the Gulf of Guinea and the Keta Lagoon, Fuveme is not only losing pieces of land to the sea, but devastating tidal waves are now much closer to its shores.

In recent years, tidal waves have hit the community, which used to be a fishing village. To make matters worse, Fuveme was also affected by further flooding from the spillage from the Akosombo Dam in 2023.

“You wake up one day, and all of a sudden, everything … is gone,” said Fuveme resident Nukpe Happy. “Sometimes in the middle of the night, all of a sudden, you’re in water. You have to rush out, bring out your belongings. [Other] belongings are just floating in the water. You don’t know what to do.”

Now, Fuveme’s school is destroyed, and fishers and farmers find it difficult to make ends meet amidst a changed and volatile environment. Many have left the island in search of employment. For those who stayed in their homes, hunger is consistently a problem.

“Those who used to go to the sea [to fish] don’t [anymore] because we experience high tides,” Happy said. “So they don’t go to the sea, and you don’t get money. Economically, it affects us.”

Food for All Africa, one of West Africa’s first food banks, visits the community regularly to provide boxes of food staples to those struggling with hunger. And The Global FoodBanking Network supports their work through technical assistance specific to disaster response and grants for expanding warehouse space or otherwise adding capacity.

To get to Fuveme, Food for All Africa staff members load up a large box truck with food at their warehouse in Shai Hills. From there, it’s a three-hour drive to the Volta Region; once there, they unload the food supplies from the truck onto several hired canoes outfitted with motors, then it’s a 45-minute ride to the Fuveme community.

On the island, Food for All Africa distributes boxes of food that include rice, canned mackerel, spaghetti noodles, beef pate, sunflower oil, dried black-eyed peas, gari (roasted, grated cassava), and Tom Brown (a nutritious powdered breakfast mix made from soya beans, groundnut, guinea corn, maize, millet, fish powder, and spices).

Nukpe Happy (52) receives a food box from Food for All Africa in the Fuveme community, which has been affected by climate change and the Akosombo dam spillage. (Photo: The Global FoodBanking Network/Julius Ogundiran)

“Food for All Africa comes to us when we’re in need, when there is a tidal wave that has affected us,” Happy said. “They always show up for us. They always bring us food, and it’s been very helpful.”

Delivering Food to Fuveme