Findings of a new research into Ghana’s agriculture industry has revealed the country loses $560 million worth of yam to post-harvest losses yearly.
The report, released by the Danish Embassy in Ghana has shown that the value of food losses and waste in Ghana is estimated at $1.9 billion per annum and yam is leading the chart with $560 million per annum.
According to the report, post-harvest losses of tomato, yam, mango, citrus and chilies accounted for the huge figure that could go a long way fuel the much needed development in agriculture sector.
Speaking to participants of a seminar organised the Danish Embassy, the Lead Researcher of the study, Dan Acquaye stated that “after the research, we realised that if you take tomato, yam, mango, citrus, and chilies with the areas that we performed the analysis, the food losses was about $1.9 billion per annum”.
“We were surprised that the food loss of yam was over $560 million per annum”.
Mr. Acquaye also revealed that the post-harvest loss of mango was about $300 million while tomatoes alone accounting for over $60 million per annum.
The report also came on the back of March 12, which marks the day of Sustainable Development Goal 12.3, which aims to drastically reduce food losses along production and supply chains.
Ahead of the day, the Embassy of Denmark organised a seminar to seek solutions from Danish and Ghanaian stakeholders, following the launch of a feasibility study for cold chain business and investment in Ghana by the Embassy.
Meanwhile, the Danish Ambassador to Ghana, Tom Norring reiterated that it is significant to form partnerships in finding solutions to challenges facing the agricultural sector in Ghana.
“Denmark is actually traditionally a farming country, hence we’ve developed a lot of solutions of which some will be applicable here and others need to be adopted to be applicable in Ghana”.
“We have companies that developed solutions for food losses such as providing cold storage, cold chain among others. We want to bring in some Danish companies to match with some Ghanaian companies to form partnerships. We believe that these kinds of partnerships create real ownership on both sides,” he stated.
The report which was outdoored by the Danish Embassy on food loss and waste in Ghana is titled, “Feasibility Study for Cold Chain Business”, made up of the transportation and distribution of temperature-sensitive products.
Source: Myjoyonline
