Adonmu (Our Beauty)

Tell us about yourself  My Name is Ojoma Ahmed, from Kogi state, a mum of 2 kids. Until recently, I have been just an IT professional (Business Intelligence) and then started an NGO about a year ago, and from that sprung a business idea. Tell us about your business, how did you start?  It’s interesting how life throws you lemons and you then make lemonades. My partner suffered a heart attack and I spent 3 months going in and out of hospital caring for him. Then I had an epiphany - a sudden realization that I needed to do something with my mundane 9-5 job and give back by developing my community.  I had a building project going on at the time, it was meant to house some family members, but I decided to use it as a training hub to offer free training to girls and young woman, then I started a community project to mechanize palm oil processing in my village, to support the women. Then it turned to a business Idea, I remembered my grand mum raised he...

Autism is a condition where a person is unable to communicate and interact with others. The person also shows some unusual behaviors that include repeating certain actions, such as shaking or nodding the head, rocking self, pacing or spinning around. Autism affects different people in different ways, it affects every race and every social class. There are over 100,000 reported cases, yearly, in Nigeria. Children with Autism find it difficult to understand what others think or feel, they find it difficult to express themselves with words or gestures. If the child is very sensitive, he/she may get troubled, or even pained, by sound, touch, smell or sights that others see as normal. Boys are 4 times more likely to be autistic than girls. Symptoms of autism usually begin to show around the first 3 years of a child's life. Even though a person with autism may find it difficult to communicate, he/she may excel in other areas like art, music, math or memorizing facts. Cause Th...

From the fruit of the Coconut Palm Tree, we press the pale-yellow oil known as Coconut Oil. The coconut got its name from Portugese and Spanish sailors who saw its resemblance to a face and called it "coco" which means head or skull. This was because of the three marking on the shell which resembled a human face. The coconut palm grows in tropical shorelines and thrives on sandy soil, abundant sunlight and regular rainfall. The fruit is fibrous with a hard shell on the inside, housing water called "coconut juice". The coconut is a nutritious source of meat, juice, milk and oil, that has nourished people all over the world for centuries. Coconut oil is pressed from fleshy white "meat" of mature coconuts. Process of Extraction 1000 coconuts weigh about 1440kg, and give about 170kg of coconut meat. This amount produces about 70 liters of coconut oil. There are basically two methods for pressing coconut oil from the fruit; the wet method and ...

The term "Special Needs Child" is usually used to describe a child who may face more challenges than a typical child, and these challenges could last for a lifetime. The child has different goals, and needs extra support to meet social, emotional, medical and academic milestones. The challenges the child faces can be physical or mental, but often require medical or professional assistance and observance. Sometimes the child is born with these challenges and sometimes they are acquired or developed. Some of the Physical Challenges include: Heart disease, Pre-maturity, Visual impairment or Blindness, Hearing impairment or Deafness, Albinism, Cancer, Epilepsy, Chronic Asthma, Diabetes, Obesity, Multiple Sclerosis, Dwarfism, Food Allergies, Cerebral Palsy, Down Syndrome. Some Emotional/Behavioral Challenges include: Bi-polar, dyslexia, Attention Deficit Disorder, Oppositional Defiance Disorder In Africa most Special Children do not live to reach adulthood b...

The African Oil Palm, growing only in tropical regions of the earth produces the palm fruit - fleshy red fruits that grow in bunches and contain a kernel within a hard shell. Originally, the Oil Palm grew only in African, it is now grown in Asia, North America and South America. Nigeria used to be the largest producer of the oil palms, now it is the third largest, after Indonesia and Malaysia. The tree lives for about 25 - 30 years, and because it continues to yield fruits during its life time it is considered a high productive crop - it is capable of yielding more oil from less land than any other vegetable oil. A bunch of the palm fruits weighs about 10kg and produces over 1000 fruits. The fruits are oval shaped, ranging from orange to red, with a hard seed that houses a round white kernel. Two types of oils are produced from the Oil Palm - Palm oil from the pulp of the fruit, and Palm Kernel Oil from the kernels within the hard shell. Both oils are edible and are also us...

Popularly known as "benne seed", sesame grows in tropical regions around the world. Most species of this plant are wild (they were not planted) and can grow in harsh conditions and drought-like areas that do not support the growth of plants, some species are native to Sub-Saharan Africa. Tanzania, Sudan and Nigeria are the largest producers of sesame seeds in Africa. Sesame also grows in India, Myanmar and China. The sesame plant is a bush and the seeds grow in pods, similar to okra. It requires little farming support and thrives in intense heat, little, or too-much rainfall, leading to the name "The Survivor Crop". The pods are covered in tiny hairs and begin to ripen, dry and finally open from the bottom of the stalk upwards. The dry pods are harvested by hand and stored upright to get completely dry until all pods open, releasing the seeds inside. The stalks are shaken, or beaten to release the seeds, then sifted to remove twigs and other debris. Sesame...

On the foothills of the Atlas Mountains of Southern Morocco grows the Argan tree, a wild tree that lives for about 150 to 200 years, it grows only in Morocco, originally. The Argan tree bears small, green, smooth fruits, similar to olives, which turns yellow and falls to the ground around May. The Berber women (natives of Morocco) pick the fallen fruits in June and July, then dry them in readiness to process the wonder oil - Argan Oil. The Argan fruit is not only sought after by people, but goats as well, the goats have learned to climb the thorny trees and eat the fruits directly from the branches, because of the high nutritional content of the fruits, these goats are called "Argan Goats" and the meat from them is tastier, more nutritious. The Argan tree, growing in arid soil, benefits the environment by helping to prevent desertification. Unfortunately, the number of Argan trees are reducing and the Government of Morocco has began to take steps to protect them...