Govt unveils ambitious agric programme in Goaso tomorrow (April 18, FRONT)
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo will, tomorrow, launch the government’s flagship agricultural programme, ‘Planting for Food and Jobs’, in Goaso in the Asunafo municipality in the Brong Ahafo Region.
Modelled on the highly successful ‘Operation Feed Yourself (OFY)’ programme of the 1970s, the initiative is expected to be driven by 200,000 farmers to be selected nationwide and individuals willing to cultivate vegetables and other crops in their backyard.
President Akufo-Addo is expected to perform the
official launch of the campaign, which is expected to revolutionise the
country's agriculture.
The aim of the project is to ensure increased food
production, while cutting down on the huge foreign exchange used in
importing food items into the country annually.
This year, maize, rice, soybean, sorghum and
vegetables, including tomato, onion and pepper, are the five main crops
for concentration.
The campaign is expected to yield food valued at GH¢1.3 billion.
The concept also has tax incentives for companies,
including the breweries and food processing companies, that are willing
to go into farming to feed their factories.
Project targets
The project is targeted at creating over 750,000
direct jobs for Ghanaians who will be actively involved in the pilot
phase of the project this year and are expected to, thereafter,
spearhead the government's agricultural modernisation policy for the
next five years.
Towards that end, a national organising committee
was inaugurated in March in this year and tasked with the responsibility
of engaging various stakeholders in preparation towards the launch.
In an interview in February this year, the Minister
of Food and Agriculture, Dr Owusu Afriyie Akoto, told the Daily
Graphic that the campaign would make the country’s agriculture more
productive at a time it was the lowest in productivity in terms of yield
in West Africa.
Cost
The government has budgeted a little over GH¢560
million to cater for the five pillars of the campaign — seeds,
fertiliser, extension services, marketing and e-monitoring.
According to a breakdown of the budget, GH¢74.7
million would go into the provision of seeds, GH¢238.7 million for
fertiliser, GH¢32 million for extension services, GH¢200 million for
marketing and GH¢15 for e-agriculture and monitoring.
Apart from the hundreds of jobs it is expected to
create, the campaign is also expected to guarantee food security and
provide cheap food for the urban areas, raw materials for the livestock
and the industrial sectors and surplus produce for export to the ECOWAS
sub-region.
Funding
Dr Akoto said while funding would come from this
year’s budget, the government was already soliciting funding from the
country’s development partners.
“So far, we are getting some good responses. The
Canadian government has offered 135 million Canadian dollars to support
the programme. The Korean government is supporting all the districts in
the Central Region with $9 million and the Chinese government is
planning on giving us fertiliser to support the programme. We are still
talking to our development partners,” he explained.
He said the plan was for households, schools and
prisons to produce enough to feed themselves, while companies that
depended on agricultural produce as raw materials were also expected to
produce enough to meet their needs.
Operation Feed Yourself
The National Redemption Council (NRC) government
launched the OFY, which turned out to be the country’s most popular food
production campaign, in 1972 to enhance food sufficiency.
According to experts, what differentiated the OFY
from previous food programmes was the initial enthusiasm the OFY created
in the country, resulting in broad acceptance and participation by the
Ghanaian population.
Thousands of Ghanaians took part in clearing land
or helping harvest crops. Urban dwellers were drawn into backyard
farming, while large-scale rice production in the northern regions
increased substantially.
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