Welcome to the 5th Edition of Inprem Speaks, it’s always a pleasure to have you as our audience. To our sponsors and volunteers words are not enough to say thank you.  We are still short staffed on most days especially on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We encourage our readers to encourage others to come and volunteer with us. We are open Monday to Friday 10: 00am to 7:00pm.

We cannot emphasize the need for funds, in our fourth newsletter as mentioned we only meet 2.2 % of the hunger needs of Ohioans, with the help of our sponsors we can raise this number to 5%. As it can be seen we are putting in all the effort to help curb the hunger crises which is subtle but real. Despite increasing our pantry visits per family from two times a month to four times a month families still show signs of need. As the saying goes, mentors help you skill up, but sponsors help you move up, we need you to move up and we need you to make this happen.

— Apostle Alex-Eric K.  Abrokwa-Clottey

Feature on Staff Volunteers 

Part 1 of 3

Inprem’s success is attributed to volunteers  and sponsors. In this edition we will like to throw more light on our staff volunteers. We call them staff volunteers because they are present everyday to see to the day to day activities of the pantry’s operations. 

Below are our staff volunteers, their input, schedule and some challenges they face. 

Mrs Evelyn Sowah Clottey and Children

Mrs. Evelyn Clottey has been a staff since 2015 to date despite having a full time job and a side job. She works Monday through Friday from 10:00 am to 7:00 pm  and on produce Saturdays from 10:00 am to 3: 00 pm. 

Daily responsibilities includes cleaning, packing, serving clients and signing clients in. On days with few or no volunteers what it means here is that Madam Evelyn has to multitask and juggle between all these responsibilities. She mentioned that Tuesdays are the most challenging days for her as she’s often the only staff volunteer from to 2:00 – 7:00pm, imagine a day like this with no walk in volunteers. She does get the help of her children after they come from school but obviously the bulk of the responsibilities is still on her shoulders.

There so many challenges she faces working daily at the pantry, the most prevalent of these though is the behavior of some clients. Some of them

are very rude, she said, we get insulted, snapped at and even threatened. In one instance, a client threatened to shoot her because she wanted canned foods and not fresh produce, this led to a police report. 

Despite all these Madam Evelyn says she loves what she does and she will continue doing it with a smile on her face. She has ways to destress and this she does through her hobbies like shopping and returns to this job even more energized. 

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The pantry has been opened Monday through Friday, 10: 00 am to 7:00 pm without fail. Most days we serve over hundred families. 

The number of volunteers we get weekly hasn’t been consistent, why we still stress on the need for volunteers. I guess the question here will be how many volunteers do we need on a daily basis? In total 7 if they are staying throughout the day. 

If not our volunteer slots are divided into the following 10:00 am to 1:00 pm ,      1:00 pm to 4:00 pm and 4:00 pm to 7:00 pm. Ideally for each volunteer slot  3 – 5 volunteers will make the burden lighter. 

August 21st which was the third Saturday of the month of August was our produce market day. We gave out produce, clothing, baby products among many other things the numbers were high as usual.

Despite the big demand in this market, cashew farmers in these areas struggle. They don’t get the financial support they need from banks and after each season they run into financial issues. 

Inprem stepped in and provided the micro loans these banks won’t give. These are no interest loans and this opportunity is creating jobs and empowering these farmers.

The Inprem team in Ghana is actively involved because they know the struggles of these people and the the ins and outs of the cashew industry so the support provided goes beyond monetary. 

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