Author: Sefakor
Immediate past Minister of Food and Agriculture and Flagbearer hopeful of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto has called for prioritisation of investment in the Tree Crop Development Authority (TCDA) for socio-economic development of Ghana. According to him, when implemented fully, the Tree Crop Development Authority could yield between six and 12 billion dollars annually, more than the three billion dollars Ghana was going to seek from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to hopefully get its economy back on track. He was speaking ahead of a public lecture at University of Professional Studies (UPSA) in Accra on…
The Host of agriculture flagship programme, The Ghanaian Farmer TV Show, Enyonam Manye has been appointed as a member of the 2023 Chamber of Aquaculture Ghana Awards Committee. The award event, scheduled for 26th-27t April 2023, is under the theme “Fostering Stakeholder Collaborations for SustainableAquaculture Industry”. This was captured in a letter addressed to Dr. Winnie Sowah of the Department of Marine and Fisheries Sciences of the University of Ghana. Miss Manye is widely known among agriculture and aquaculture practitioners for her work of sharing educative contents and knowledge on the sectors through TV documentaries on Joy Prime TV other…
The World Food Programme plans to develop a digital application to track food and nutrition and encourage a general healthy lifestyle in Ghana. According to the Country Representative and Director, Barbara Clemens, it is important for people to treat food security and nutrition with seriousness, adding that limited resources are major hindrances for the ordinary Ghanaian. “Our vision for Ghana is that we’re liaising with partners in the private sector, other UN organisations and also the government. We’re creating a digital loyalty APP. The Ghana Health Service has a social protection change mandate for all Ghanaians to eat healthily, have…
Six agricultural enthusiasts from Nigeria were taken on a farm tour in Ghana by Count On Crops Hub, producers of the Ghanaian Farmer TV Show. According to the host of the flagship TV and online program, Enyonam Manye the six men are regular viewers of the show that put the spotlight agribusiness in Ghana. Being a specialized agricultural agency that is leading small holder farmers in redefining the future of agriculture in Ghana and Africa, the six tourists from Nigeria fell in love with the work Count On Crops Hub have been doing over the years. They decided to visit…
The exorbitant prices of fertilisers from two world leading producers, Russia and Ukraine has forced farmers in Ghana to look for alternatives that will keep their businesses afloat. According to some agronomists farmers in Ghana have switched to growing crops that do not call for imported inorganic fertilizers after prices skyrocketed resulting from the war in Ukraine. Reports say there a 60 percent reduction in fertilizer imports which led to skyrocketing prices due to the war in Ukraine and western-led sanctions on Russian companies. Public Affairs Manager of Ghana COCOBOD, Fiifi Boafo, admonished farmers to use chicken manure as an…
Ghana’s aquaculture is facing an imminent collapse, which will have serious repercussions on national food security and the incomes of thousands of people along the value chain. The government’s reluctance to effectively introduce subsidies on fish feed, a major component of the business, has led to many farmers folding up their businesses. According to Evans Kojo Danso, a fish farmer who has been in the business for seven years, only about 70 out of about 1,200 registered fish farmers across the country are currently active in the business. This figure indicates that over 90 per cent of farmers have lost…
A commercial rice farmer, Fred Kukubor has advocated for commercial agribusiness in Ghana in order to meet the food needs of the country. According to him, commercialisation drives market and investment, adding the ‘old system of farming’ is the reason the country is unable to meet the demand for its foods needs. “We’re unable to meet our food needs and requirements as a country largely because of our small-holder nature system but commercialisation is the way to go if we really mean business as a country or as an agribusiness company.” “If you want to commercial, you can start with…
Patience Kpeda is a 33-year-old woman who works as an Agriculture Extension Officer in the Denkyembour District of the Eastern Region. The mother of one who has been working in this capacity for the past nine years discovered that there’s a very high level of post-harvest losses among the small-scale farmers she works with. This means, these farmers after painfully engaging in the hard labour, usually struggle to bounce back in most farming seasons. For Madam Kpeda, it will be incomplete to teach farmers on the best agriculture practices about increasing their yields when they do not know modern ways…
A Ghanaian-owned agriculture e-commerce platform, Asinyo.com is supporting local farmers to address post harvest losses they experience every year by linking them directly to buyers. While paying a visit to a group of small-scale farmers in Takuve-Ziope in the Volta region, “most of the farmers who have limited or no formal education, confessed their struggle with frequent post-harvest losses, which force them to sell their produce for low prices despite the resources invested in the farming process.” According to the farmers, the annual losses are due to the absence of a ready market and the poor road networks, which deter…
The term Agriculture is derived from two Latin words ager or agri meaning soil and cultura or Cultus meaning cultivation. Agriculture is the science of cultivating the soil, harvesting crops, and raising livestock and also the science or art of the production of plants and animals useful to man and in varying degrees the preparation of such products for man’s use. As an art, it embraces knowledge of the way to perform the operations of the farm in a skillful manner but does not necessarily include the understanding of the principles underlying the farm practices. As a science, it utilizes…