“We Didn’t Know Money”: Cocoa Farmer talks School Fees & Making Money as Children

Patrick Ansah is a cocoa farmer, a mechanic, and a blacksmith. He lives in Asamankese where he fixes trucks.

But Patrick’s cocoa farm is 93 km away from Asamankese, in a village called Larteh Amanbete in Ghana’s Central Region. This is the village he grew up in and learned to farm cocoa from his grandfather. And it’s in this village you’ll find Patrick when farmers in Ghana are busily working on their farms.

In this story, Patrick shares his school days as a cocoa farmers’ grandson, how his grandfather paid his school fees with cocoa money, and how children could also make money.

How Grandfather paid school fees

In our school days, when it was time to pay school fees [at the beginning of the term], my grandfather would speak to the teachers to give him some time.

Instead of September [when the academic year began], he usually paid our fees in November – December. And he paid for all trimesters at once. So we were were never sent home for not paying school fees.

When he harvests cocoa, he puts together all the money and pays for all our educational needs.

So, for us, cocoa was used to pay our school fees. If my grandfather would pay for our school uniforms, or books and stationery, it would all come from cocoa money.

So at the beginning of the academic year, my grandfather would go to school and ask my class teacher, ‘Teacher, so what would the children need?’ Because if the harvest season passes, he wouldn’t get the money.

So the teacher gives him a list, and we go to the market together to buy everything.

Taking food to school

I never took money to school, unlike today where we give money to kids each day to buy food in school.

We wake up at dawn about 4 AM and put food on fire.

By 6 AM the food is ready, then we eat and set off for school. On the day you’re late, you’ll have to carry the food in a bowl and eat it on the way. When you’re done eating, you stash the bowl under a bush and pick it up on your return home after school.

Ampesi is what we normally eat in the mornings. Boiled plantain, or cocoyam. Those take less time to cook. But when they are out of season, we cook cassava.

My grandmother often made palm soup, so every morning, we’d heat it and serve it with the boiled plantain/cocoyam/cassava.

How children made money

So, in our time, we didn’t know money. Unless on your own, you go to gather kola nuts when it’s in season.

At 4 or 4:30 AM, we set off to hunt for kola nuts on our farm. We bring it to our grandmother who puts all of them together and sells them on market days, then she brings us the money.

That was how we children made money. So, hunting kola nuts was for kids. Adults didn’t do that.

My grandfather planted a lot of kola nuts among the cocoa plants. And kola nut boomed in those days, so that was for us the children to get money.

If you’re lazy and you don’t go to hunt kola nuts, you have no money to take to school.

We used the money to buy waakye at school during breaktime. Or sometimes we’d buy roasted peanuts and gari.

Patrick has and his wife have two kids. They all live in Asamankese where the children attend school. Watch out for more interesting stories from this great farmer.

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