Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto
MINISTER FOR Food and Agriculture, Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto, has stated that the strategic intervention and the success of the Planting for Food and Jobs (PFJ) campaign, clearly speaks to the government’s relentless efforts at systematically addressing the long-standing problems of Ghana’s agriculture.
He said since 2017, massive investments had been made by the government in the various subsectors of agriculture resulting in significant achievements.
Making a statement in Parliament on the impending celebration of the 38th edition of the National Farmers’ Day at Koforidua in the Eastern Region, the minister indicated that notable impacts were visible in the food crops subsector.
According to him, under the sector, farmers continued to benefit from subsidised inputs programmes and millions of seedlings of six selected tree crops distributed free of charge to farmers throughout the country, as part of the diversification agenda of the government.
Dr. Akoto said the horticultural subsector now had three new greenhouse centres located at Dawhenya, Bawjiase and Akomadan in the Greater Accra, Central and Ashanti regions respectively.
Others included the construction and rehabilitation of major irrigation schemes, feeder roads and 80 (1000mt tons capacity) warehouses constructed throughout the country.
“The positive outcomes of these activities are reflected in the macro-economic statistics. In 2019, the agriculture sector grew by 4.7% followed by 7.4% in 2020 and a record 8.4% in 2021,” he noted.
He stated that with the excellent rains this year, the government expected the substantial growth performance of recent years to be repeated this year 2022.
“The strong growth in recent years has increased the share of the agriculture sector in Ghana’s GDP from 18% in 2016 to 22% by 2021. These impressive results were posted by the sector against all odds, when multiple external shocks and unfavourable external global conditions had impacted virtually every economy including Ghana,” he asserted.
He said supply chains had been badly disrupted resulting in acute shortage in critical inputs like fertilisers, the animal sector which had been badly hit by diseases such as swine flu and the Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza, while farmlands were also being destroyed by galamsey activities.
“We, in government, recognise that the impressive performance of the agricultural sector is largely due to sacrifices and the tireless efforts of our heroic farmers. As a people, the least we can do, therefore, is to continue to celebrate and reward our farmers with rising farm productivity and incomes,” he submitted.
This year’s celebration is being held on the theme: “Accelerating Agricultural Development Through Value Addition,” and Dr. Akoto said the theme aligned with government’s vision of modernising and transforming agriculture, relevant objectives of the President’s Coordinated Programme of Socio-economic Development Policies, and the Sustainable Development Goals especially, Goals 1 and 2 which advocated the eradication of extreme poverty in all forms and zero hunger respectively.
In keeping with tradition, President Akufo-Addo will lead the celebration at a grand durbar and awards ceremony.
BY Ernest Kofi Adu, Parliament House