Members of the BRAVE project, hosted by Institute for Environment and Sanitation Studies (IESS) at the University of Ghana, undertook a three days scoping visit to two of the project communities in northern Ghana in February 2016. The scoping was undertaken in collaboration with BRAVE project implementing partner CARE Ghana. The scoping team was made up of Shani Haruna (BRAVE Technical Officer); and Musah Neindow and Kalian Gumah (CARE District Facilitators for East Mamprusi and Garu-Tempane districts respectively).

Community meeting at Akara	Samini community meeting
Dry season garden in Akara	Dry season garden in Samini
Dug-out used for dry season farming in Akara	Dug-out well used for dry season farming in Samini

The communities visited are Samini in the East Mamprusi district of the Northern region, and Akara in the Garu-Tempane district of the Upper East region. The second scoping visit was a follow up to a first scoping visit that was conducted in November 2015.

The purpose of the second scoping visit was to enable the project team to take the project through all necessary community entry processes in the two communities, introduce the project to the communities and also gather as much information as possible from the communities.The scoping team went through a number of activities in each of the two communities. In each community, the team first visited the chief’s/queen’s palace to introduce themselves to the chief/queen and inform the traditional authorities about start of the BRAVE project. Afterwards, community meetings were organised in each of the communities to introduce the project to the community members.

School children at a Borehole in Akara	A well in Samini
Woman preparing dawadawa in Akara	A petty trader at Samini

After the community meetings, the team then scoped the entire community with particular interest in groundwater sources (boreholes, wells) used for domestic uses, groundwater used for agricultural purposes (dug-outs) and evidence of dry season farming, and other types of livelihoods in the community besides farming.