Sound the trumpets! Beat up the drums!! Get on the dance floor!!! Pour out the drinks!!!! Raise a toast and shout the cheers!!!! Today 11 January 2023 is the 10 years birthday anniversary of Adamfo Ghana. Adamfo Ghana is an organisation dedicated to A better future for street connected children in Ghana. Looking back on the past 10 years, we can rightfully and proudly say that we have made tremendous difference in the lives of many individuals directly and indirectly through our work with local partners in Ghana. From Accra to Kumasi, through to Tamale and to Dunkwa-On-Offin among other localities, Adamfo Ghana has supported individuals and communities through our three main programme lines of: 1) Family Based Care and Education; 2)Employment & Entrepreneurship and; 3)Awareness Raising & Advocacy. Through these programme lines, we’ve been able to raise funds to support a great many projects based on local needs and implemented by trusted local partners on the ground.

As an organisation, we are proud of how far we’ve come in realising the dream of providing opportunities to the less privileged in Ghanaian society. One may ask, where and how did Adamfo Ghana begin? Well, let me tell you a short story….On a winter’s day on Friday 11 January 2013, my dear wife Marre and I, with the help of my father-in-law Koos took the step of formally setting up our foundation/Stichting Adamfo Ghana through legal registration and filling the paperwork at the Dutch Chamber of Commerce (Kamer voor Koophandel). We had come to the Leeuwarden (Netherlands) for Christmas & New Year holidays as a this was a time when we were living in Barcelona where I was studying. Much like the birth of a child, the dream of settting up Adamfo Ghana was conceived off much earlier. We had to carry that dream (talking about it, imagining it and planning for it) like a pregnancy for years before it became a reality – almost suddenly around the dining table like the waters breaking for a pregnant woman). It was sometime after Marre and I met in 2008 and dreamt of a future together that we began to talk about how that future might look like and what contribution we desired to make in society. In addition to a dream of a family life in Ghana (which is still yet to be a reality😃), we dreamt of setting up a foundation or organisation for education or street children as our mission to contribute to the world. Consequently, on 5 March 2011, we finally put on paper our Family Vision and Mission and signed it off as our guiding principles for life.

This date means that it was only a week after our wedding in Ghana that we wrote down the Family Vision (In all we do, to be an example in love. In all we do, to do it in love) and Mission (covering US, OUR CHILDREN, OUR HOME, OUR WORK and THE WORLD).

The past 10 years of Adamfo Ghana has been made possible through hardwork, voluntary time investment and the funding generosity of some many individuals and organisations over the years. There are so many people to thank that one run the risk of forgetting some when the rollcall begins. But begin we must and where else to start that to say a big thank you to my lovely wife Marre who has been the foundation and driver for the flourishing of Adamfo Ghana. She has volunteered her time, passion and knowledge and been the jack-of-all-trades from the start as Dreamer, Founder, Secretary, Fundraiser, PR person, IT person (she built our starting website from scratch learning on the go), Trouble-shooter, Problem-Solver, all-round AMAZING person and board member, and so many other descriptors can be used for her than can be contained here. Shout out and big thanks are due also to my mother-in-law Nelleke who through Koot Art shop generously funded the start-up of our organisation so we can pay for the legal fees and filing cost with some change for the website hosting cost; to my father-in-law Koos who was generous with sharing his experience and coming on board us our first treasurer and remains a part of our board. Shout out to all our past board members – Hanneke and Akwasi – and current board members of Karlijn, Edna, Christian, Maureen (see video below for their self-introductions)…thanks to all our supporters, individual and organisational donors, those who like and share our updates and many many others who in various ways have and continue to support our work.

We want to celebrate Adamfo Ghana’s 10 years anniversary throughout this year of 2023 in both big and small ways. We hope that you will join us in marking this august occasion and join hands with us to dream of

We want to celebrate Adamfo Ghana’s 10 years anniversary throughout this year of 2023 in both big and small ways – so be on the look-out. We will take time to show appreciation to those supporting us, to highlight some of our achievements and lessons learnt over the past year and rejoice in what we are able to do in contributing to better lives for street connected children in Ghana. We hope that you will join us in marking this august occasion and join hands with us to dream of another 10 years of changing lives.

So….sound the trumpets! Beat up the drums!! Get on the dance floor!!! Pour out the drinks!!!! Raise a toast and shout the cheers because Adamfo Ghana is 10 years today!!!!