On the 16th of October, 2021, the Kweku Andoh Sustainability Institute (KASI) was opened to an audience from the country and the diaspora. Situated in Liate Wote in the Volta Region which is also home to Ghana’s tallest mountain Afadjato, the sustainability institute was built by the HABESHA (Helping Afrika By Establishing Schools Home and Abroad) organisation which is made up of a number of Afrikans from the diaspora currently living in Ghana. The opening of the Institute was graced by the chief, elders and community people from Liate Wote who treated the invited guests to some cultural performances.
Speaking to the gathered audience, the Executive Director of HABESHA, Cashawn Myers, informed the audience of the journey to bring the dream into reality. The project, he shared has taken five years and brought together a wide range of locals with expertise in various skills to complete. KASI, he further added, is designed to be a research institute where Afrikans globally can come and learn indigenous knowledge. He went on to give invited guests a tour of the Institute.
The Institute which sits on about six acres of land, has facilities which include a bamboo pavilion for workshops, five earth domes built of laterite using a patented machine from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). These are living spaces. Four additional storey buildings are featured for accomodation, kitchen, and classrooms. The Institute also houses a farm, a solar park, which powers the entire facility, a bamboo tree house and groove which allows for tenting and camping.
KASI is named in honor of world-renowned Ghanaian ethno-botanist Dr. A. Kweku Andoh. Dr. Andoh was dedicated to research in ethno-botany and traditional medicine and he was dedicated to Ghana. KASI aims to shape the future of Afrikans through learning and sharing of indigenous knowledge and information systems of housing development, renewal energy, water conservation, and traditional medicine/healing, and the arts. For US by US.
