Growers in Ghana have appealed to the authorities to provide them with new irrigation facilities. A statement issued by the Eastern Gomoa Export Vegetable Farmers Association said that with the new facilities growers would be able to provide year round produce.

The statement pointed out that demand for exports was currently greater than the ability to produce due to water restrictions. The increased availability of produce for export was likely to have positive implications for the wider economy the statement pointed out.

Source: www.ghanabusinessnews.com

Nothing better illustrates the crucial role that science must play in farming in Africa, than the contrasts in agricultural productivity between our continent and the world as a whole. For while food productivity has increased globally by 140 per cent in recent decades, the figures for sub-Saharan Africa over the same period show a fall.

This is not because of any lack of effort by Africa’s farmers. Agriculture remains for far too many an exhausting dawn to dusk occupation for very little reward. Indeed, it is because farming across much of the continent has changed little in generations that the role of science is so important.

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The Brong Ahafo Regional Minster, Kwadwo Nyamekye- Marfo, has advised farmers and other stakeholders in the agricultural sector, to strategically position themselves, to enable them benefit from the imminent foreign investments in the sector in the region.

He revealed that a number of foreign investors had expressed interest in investing in agriculture in the region, especially, in the area of agro-processing.

The Minister, who announced this at the regional celebration of National Farmers Day held in Wamfie in the Dormaa East District, was happy to note that the issue of post harvest losses would soon be a thing of the past when the investors finally implement their decision to invest in the region.

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Mr Paul Ainoo, Chairman of the Cape Coast Farmers Cooperative Society limited (CCFCSL), has appealed to government to put in place a policy framework for the establishment of an institution, which would be responsible for the development and promotion of citrus and lime sector to prevent the sector from a total collapse.

He said due to the lack of a vibrant market and a body to manage the sector, most citrus and lime farmers have either cut down their citrus trees or have altogether deserted citrus farming for other means of livelihood whilst others were contemplating abandoning citrus farming for other ventures.

Mr Ainoo, who said this during a sensitization programme organised by the Business Sector Advocacy Challenge Fund (BUSAC) in Cape Coast on Tuesday, said citrus farmers who were over 10,000 across the country and mostly smallholders, faced a lot of challenges regardless of being one of the largest fruit industries in Ghana.

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Most tomato farmers in the Upper East Region have switched into pepper production and other major vegetables such as onions, garden eggs, and hibiscus, to avert the annual rituals that cause financial loss to them.

Over the years, tomato farmers in the region have gone through frustrations, as a result of financial loss, following poor market availability of their produce. Some farmers in the past committed suicide, because they could no longer bear the pressure from their bankers for failing to resettle loans they took to invest in their farming business.

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