Ghanaian Migrants Information Services - Time to Move Beyond This Annual Ritual

Accra — Agriculture, though has remained one of the priority areas of the development strategies of successive governments, is yet to make an impact in the overall national economic growth efforts.

Given that over 60% of Ghanaians are engaged in this sector, and also that poverty is most manifest here, there is no gainsaying that much work, together with political will, is required here if the national poverty situation is to be altered in a way that makes the Millennium Development Goal on poverty achievable.

One of the major reasons the agriculture sector is characterized by poverty is the constraint related to market access both internal and external. It is certainly not rewarding if farmers cannot be supported to market their produce at least to recover their production cost especially in a glut situation. Transporting their produce to the market itself has turned out to be the cost variable most prone to hikes. In the absence of a cheaper bulk haulage facility such as rail transport for farm produce, farmers' incomes have over the years been eroded by the ever-increasing road transport cost.

Access to foreign markets is also restricted by ridiculous standards and criteria set by the US and EU trading partners.

There is no doubt that one of the surest ways to secure the local market for Ghanaian farmers, is to design trade policies that are friendlier to the Ghanaian producer, and to use the budget as a tool for providing incentive to the local producer in our efforts at ensuring food sufficiency. We may fail in anything else, but we must not fail in our effort to feed ourselves.

It is in this regard that Public Agenda calls on the N.D.C. government to move the country beyond this annual ritual of awarding farmers for their hard work and introduce revolutionary measures to fundamentally transform the agricultural sector. In terms of a national strategy one would want to see some forms of subsidies for the producers of food crops, rehabilitation of the Kumasi - Accra rail transport network, an increase in the tariffs on rice and poultry products to create an agricultural support fund, the commitment of resources for the construction of irrigation dams, and food storage facilities, and the provision of incentives to food processing companies using local agriculture produce.

It's time indeed to move beyond the rhetoric, lip service and annual rituals that make little difference to the lot of farmers in this country.

Public Agenda (Accra)