Farmers want swift implementation of policies to reduce cost

Their plea comes on a day when Ghana joins the globe to observe World Food Day. Some farmers say they are still dependent on weather to grow their crops and are suffering serious post-harvest losses.

This year’s Food Day celebration focuses on how agricultural cooperatives and producer organizations can help provide food security, generate employment, and reduce poverty.

In the Builsa District, one of the rice baskets of the Upper East region, farmers are preparing to harvest their produce.

A farmer who talked to Joy News complained of lack of available market, stressing that not even government agencies go to their aid to buy their produce.

“The market is always determined by the market women, they would just come without scales they come with their bowls and they will buy at low price,” he said.

He recounted the extent in which the prevailing situation has also affected them: “We can’t pay school fees, you can’t pay your bank loans, there are other things you can’t do…so it is really bring us down.”

In the Bawku West district, women engaged in shea-butter production say a processing plant donated to them is lying fallow without power to get it functioning.

Alhaji Abu Yariya who is one of the farmers in the Upper West region also complained about difficulties in raising capital to grow their businesses.

Meanwhile, Deputy General Secretary of the General Agricultural Workers Union, Edward Karowe says government has to show real commitment to see the agricultural sector grow.

He explains the lack of budget support has accounted for the shortfall in production and development in the agricultural sector of the economy.

However, Chief Executive Officer of the Savannah Accelerated Development Authority, Alhaji Seidu Iddi says despite government’s efforts at developing the agric sector, SADA is rolling out key interventions to help develop agriculture in the Northern and Upper regions.

Play the attached audio to listen to what they said

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