Government is initiating pragmatic measures that would ensure Ghanaian farmers get ready market and competitive prices for their produce as part of the second phase of its ‘Planting for Food and Jobs’ (PFJ) flagship programme.
The measures include off-taker arrangements and commodity trading to improve farmer access to markets that guarantee fair prices for crops.
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo announced these when he launched Phase Two of government’s flagship programme on agriculture, “Planting for Food and Jobs”, at the University for Development Studies, in Tamale on Monday.
He said there will be a digitised platform for management, monitoring and coordination to improve efficiency and effectiveness of the programme.
President Akufo-Addo indicated that key elements of the new phase also include an input credit system that provides farmers with access to inputs such as seeds, fertilizers and pesticides and other support services for improving productivity and yield as well as storage infrastructure and logistic hub to improve storage and distribution of produce to reduce post-harvest losses.
The second phase of the programme is a five-year master plan for the transformation of agriculture in Ghana with focus on modernisation through the development of a selected commodity value chain and active private sector participation.
It is targeted at building on the successes of the initial programme.
According to President Akufo-Addo, the second phase, by design, “takes a holistic view and places greater emphasis on value chain approaches by focusing on strengthening linkages between actors along eleven selected agricultural commodity value chains broadly categorised into grains, roots and tuber, vegetables and poultry.”
He added that Phase Two of the Programme also seeks to improve service delivery to maximise impact, and substitutes direct input subsidy with smart agricultural financial support in the form of comprehensive input credit, with provision for in-kind payment.
PFJ II to create 210,000 Jobs
President Akufo-Addo has given assurance that the phase II of the PJF will create an annual average of 210,000 new farm-related jobs.
He explained that the new phase will exclude other jobs along the agricultural value chains.
“The impact of the Programme is expected to be in the area of job creation, with some one-point-two million (1.2 million) farmers to be enrolled in the first year. In the next four (4) years, the Programme is destined to record an annual average of two hundred and ten thousand (210,000) new farm-related jobs,” President Akufo-Addo reiterated.
‘Planting for Food & Jobs’
It would be recalled that President Akufo-Addo launched the maiden “Planting for Food and Jobs” programme on 19th April, 2017, at Goaso in the Ahafo region to represent government’s key initiative to modernise agriculture, improve production efficiency, achieve food security, and profitability for our farmers.
It summarily targeted a significant increase in agricultural productivity and pursued a value-addition strategy, aimed at rapidly ramping up agro-processing and developing new and stable markets.
President Akufo-Addo noted that the successful implementation of the first phase has resulted in reaching over 2.7 million farmers and other value chain actors under the five modules.
It also ensured a relatively stable food security environment with food self-sufficiency in major food staples such as maize, cassava and yam and an increased agricultural sector growth rate from 2.7% in 2016 to an average of 6.3% from 2017 to 2021.
“Government has, thus, been able to achieve the annual target of six percent (6%) of sector growth, set under the Malabo Declaration to which Ghana is a signatory, increased fertilizer application rate from eight kilogrammes per hectare (8 kg/ha) in 2016 to twenty-five kilogrammes per hectare (25 kg/ha) in 2022, an increased distribution of certified seeds from two thousand metric tons (2,000 MT) in 2016 to thirty-six thousand metric tons (36,000 MT) in 2022 and an increased private sector investment in the seed industry,” he said.
President Akufo-Addo was happy to disclose that, a recent Summit, organised by the United Nations on the need to build country food systems in September 2021 in New York and at the AU Dakar II Summit in January 2022, underscored the need for the review of strategies for delivering solutions to challenges in the agricultural sector.
“It is praise-worthy that Ghana has responded to the call to action at both Summits by rolling out the Second Phase of the PFJ Programme.
“I continue to give you my pledge that farmers, food crop farmers, fish farmers and livestock farmers will all have the support and respect they deserve from my government. We need to raise agriculture to a higher plane to be able to improve on the quality of life for our people,” President Akufo-Addo assured.
