Please cause the attached (see below) to be circulated to all Ogbaruans in the U.S.A., and the rest of the world by posting same on the web page.  The Ogbaru Agricultural Development Foundation (OFADEP), a non-governmental and non-political organization, is all about contributing to solving some of the problems of Ogbaru.  Please help to link us to charities in USA, which in your opinion may be well disposed to assisting such bodies as our Foundation.  We also solicit for donations from Ogbaruans the world over. 

Why OFADEP?  No true Ogbaru man or woman will feign ignorance of the glaring violence being inflicted on the Ogbaru nation.  We say so because we believe that any deliberate neglect of any matter, issues or persons is a form of violence.  Likewise, people who either by omission or commission neglect issues that affect their very existence are also inflicting violence on themselves.  The meaning of OFADEP is a resolve to take the bull by the horns.  OFADEP is therefore an organ through which the interests of the Ogbaru farmers in particular shall better represented in all ramifications of agricultural matters in the Country.  It is also aimed at creating! a forum for harnessing the positive concerns of our people, and our friends, both at home and abroad, for the overall agricultural development of our people.  It is as well aimed at making our people look inwards and help Ogbaru regain Food Power as a bargaining chip in our dealings with the world around us.  OFADEP is designed to be a veritable vehicle for the emancipation and growth of Ogbaru farmers, and to push the frontiers of Ogbaru farming tradition in a sustainable way. 

 Best regards,

      <Sgd.>

Obibulu G.N. Esimai

Executive Director, OFADEP

 OGBARU AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT FOUNDATION (OFADEP)

 Ogbaru Agricultural Development Foundation (OFADEP) is a non-governmental, and non-political organization.  Our primary aim is to seek avenues to empower peasant farmers in Ogbaru Local Government Area, Anambra State, Nigeria, and to help them improve on their farming activity.  Our focus is to make farming and agriculture generally, attractive to the young in particular.  It is only through this that agriculture in Ogbaru could be sustained.    We have in Ogbaru, migration of ill equipped youths to urban centers in search of jobs.  Ogbaru, for centuries, have a tradition of farming, but in recent times, because of cultural encroachment on the people from outside, the farming class in Ogbaru is rapidly depleting, so much   so that in less than thirty years from now, given that average age of the first generation of farmers is over 55 years, there would not be any farmer of Ogbaru origin left to carry on the age-long tradition. 

 Ogbaru Agricultural Development Foundation was founded in 2001 to start the nucleus of a sustainable programme for aiding of Ogbaru farmers through micro credit; to help them to produce to meet the demands of the time. The purpose of this floatation is to solicit your assistance in fulfilling the objectives of the OFADEP.  If we achieve the desired funding, we will increase the number of beneficiaries of micro credit by two hundred and forty.  Our objective is to involve One Thousand Farmers, both young and old, male and female, in ten years from now across the fifteen indigenous autonomous communities of Ogbaru. Meanwhile, we are sourcing for Seventy-five Thousand US Dollars to make our programme meaningful as follows: 

    The micro credit would revolve every two years until we reach our target of One Thousand.  If the sub-Saharan Africa would benefit from such projects as African Growth and Opportunity Act of the United States Government, it would first have and execute a very serious agrarian policy, and create an enabling environment for individual farmer to making good. J Meanwhile, only few organizations in Apparel industry is benefiting from AGOA.  Most of Africa are into subsistence agriculture.  You can help Ogbaru to acquire Food Power; to have enough to eat and to export.  In Ogbaru, farmers are into arable crops, tree crops and livestock and fisheries.  The Foundation would encourage increased production in these areas through your kindly outreach.

 No amount of money would be too small to donate to the Foundation.  You would be saving a lot of lives by extending a hand of pity to those who need to clutch at it to ‘breathe the purer air of life’.  Such people are our reason for founding OFADEP.  Make your decision today, and reach out to us at ogbarufarmers@yahoo.com.   If you wish to know more about Ogbaru, please visit Ogbaru website at www.ogbaru.org

 Information on the Executive Director of the Foundation is as follows:

¨       Retired (Former) Manager, British-American Insurance Company Ltd;

¨       Farmers

¨       Secretary General, Anambra State Chapter of the All Farmers Apex Association of Nigeria (ALFAAN); President, Ogbaru Divisional Co-Operative Council (DCC);

¨       Secretary, Board of Trustees, ALFAAN, Anambra State;

¨      Secretary General, Ogbaru Development Association (an umbrella body for the fifteen indigenous autonomous communities of Ogbaru.);

¨       Auxiliary Extension Agent to the Agricultural Development Programme of the Anambra State Ministry of Agriculture;

¨       Author:  1) Imperatives of Farmers Empowerment in Anambra State:  Ogbaru as a Pilot Zone

2) Ogbaru Agricultural Development Scheme – A Way Forward to Perpetuating   Ogbaru Farming Tradition.

¨       Vice Chairman, Anambra State Fish Farmers and Fishermen Apex Co-Operative Society Limited

  We wish you increasing prosperity as you move to identify with out cause.

 God bless you.  

                <Sgd.>

OBIBULU G.N. ESIMAI

Executive Director, OFADEP