A bright six-unit classroom block now stands tall in Tongor-Tsita, a farming community in Ghana’s Volta Region where children once studied in makeshift sheds that collapsed under heavy rain or offered little shelter from the blazing sun.
The new structure, complete with wide windows, solid roofing, and a nearby four-seater toilet facility, signals a turning point for pupils, teachers, and parents.
A borehole is also underway to provide safe drinking water, sparing families the daily struggle of fetching from unsafe sources. For a community long left behind, these are not just projects, they are lifelines.
The transformation is the work of TopAfric, a Hamburg-based non-profit founded by Ghanaian social entrepreneur and philanthropist Desmond John Beddy.
From its early beginnings as a diaspora platform offering support services to Africans in Germany, the organization has evolved into a driving force for development in rural Ghana, targeting education, health, water, and sanitation.
TopAfric’s impact began to ripple across Ghana in 2023 when it handed over a six-unit classroom block with a storeroom, teachers’ office, and borehole in Adaklu-Blidokope. For the first time, children studied in a dignified environment with safe water nearby.
Two years later, the organization’s footprint had spread wider, reaching communities where infrastructure deficits had stalled growth for decades. In Hikpo, a borehole was completed before the local health post was upgraded into a fully equipped facility that today serves as the frontline for healthcare delivery.
In Agortive, a six-unit classroom block with a computer lab was constructed, opening doors to digital literacy for children who had never touched a computer. At Anyarko, TopAfric initiated plans for a borehole, giving the community new hope for clean water.
What sets the organization apart is its attention to detail. Schools are not just buildings; they come fully furnished with desks, chairs, and whiteboards so that classes can begin immediately.
Health facilities are not symbolic structures but functional spaces where people can seek treatment. Each borehole is planned with community input, ensuring accessibility and long-term use.
But the vision goes further than providing infrastructure. Desmond John Beddy has consistently emphasized sustainability, highlighting that Ghana’s development challenge often lies not in building but in maintaining.
TopAfric champions a culture of routine maintenance, modest budgets for repairs, and training for local custodians to prevent projects from falling into disrepair. The goal is to ensure that every classroom, borehole, or health post built today will remain useful for generations.
This practical approach is tied to the organization’s diaspora roots. TopAfric draws on international support from Africans abroad through funding, advocacy, and expertise, while mobilizing communities at home to own and protect these assets.
TopAfric draws on international support from established German organisations, German donors, and Africans in the diaspora, leveraging funding, advocacy and technical expertise.
The model demonstrates how the diaspora and global partners can play a transformative role beyond remittances, shaping sustainable development in ways that governments alone cannot.
Across the communities where TopAfric has intervened, the results are visible. Children learn without fear of their classrooms collapsing in storms. Families fetch safe water within walking distance, protecting them from waterborne diseases.
Health workers provide care in functional facilities rather than makeshift structures. Each project creates a ripple effect that improves education, health, and livelihoods, reinforcing the idea that true progress is built step by step.
From Adaklu-Blidokope to Tongor-Tsita, Hikpo, Agortive, and Anyarko, TopAfric is proving that change is possible when vision meets commitment. The work is far from finished, but each new project tells a story of dignity restored, opportunities created, and lives transformed.
With continued support from international donors, the diaspora, and the committed TopAfric team, the organization is determined to keep building, one school, one borehole, one health facility at a time, until access to education, clean water, and healthcare is no longer a privilege but a reality for all.
