The Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) has pledged to support AGRA’s five-year strategy to transform agriculture in the country.
AGRA is an alliance led by Africans with roots in farming communities across Africa which pursues the transformation of African agriculture from a solitary struggle to a thriving business.
Mr Yaw Frimpong Addo, a Deputy Minister of Agric in Charge of Crops, noted that effective partnership in the agricultural sector would help boost the economy, ensure food security and enhance agricultural productivity in the country.
The deputy minister made the pledge at the launch of AGRA 3.0 strategy 2023 to 2027 in Accra.
The five-year strategy would strengthen the institutional capacity for the transformation of agri-food systems, promote agro-processing and value addition to create shared value, and ensure inclusivity in the agro-processing sub-sector.
The five-year plan would also empower and involve youth and women in Ghana’s agricultural transformation.
The Deputy Minister acknowledged the strong collaboration and effort made by AGRA in assisting the agricultural sector to strive.
Mr Addo noted that since 2017, AGRA had been a formidable partner in Ghana’s effort to transform agriculture and during that period, over $16 million had been invested in several aspects of agriculture, particularly in policy processes, seeds market and soil health which had been part of the Planting for Food and Jobs (PFJ) initiative.
The Deputy Minister said that within the five-year execution period, Ghana would be taken to another level in agriculture as AGRA had been a backbone to the Ministry.
He said: ‘Anything that will enhance productivity of agriculture, we have to give our full encouragement and support to any organization and AGRA since 2006 has been a very good partner at that, especially in the development of good policies’.
‘Every venture taken by government without a policy guideline will be just funfair but AGRA has supported us to come out with good policies on fertilizer, tree crop development authority, and now they are even developing something on agricultural extension officers.’
Mr Augustine Collins Ntim, Deputy Minister for Local Government, Decentralisation and Rural Development, affirmed the important contribution AGRA had made towards agriculture in the past five to six years.
He said the district level had enjoyed many collaboration with policies such as the implementation of the PFJ, Planting for Export and Rural development and modernisation for Agriculture.
Mr Ntim said that diversity in Ghana’s agricultural system was key hence the five-years strategic plan by AGRA.
Ms Regina Richardson, Programme Officer, AGRA Country Office, said agriculture was dynamic and as the global environment kept changing with increased population, ensuring quality food was key.
She added that the five-year strategy would focus more on agriculture as a very critical tool to sustain the population.
‘As AGRA, we are very excited to have this launch today. It also reflects the continuation of AGRA’s partnership with the Government of Ghana to ensure that we are able to support government in achieving its agricultural transformational agenda, which also feeds into the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals of ensuring a world without hunger and a world where everybody has enough quality food to eat.’
The five-year strategy is expected to unlock investment opportunities for agricultural value chain, by strengthening the market segment of the value chain.
‘There are instances where productivity is high in some places, yet there is scarcity in other places, so we need to ensure effective marketing and distribution systems to ensure that wherever there is productivity, it is given for the entire population to have access by ensuring effective market structures and effective partnership.’ Ms Richardson added.
Partners and stakeholders in the sector also pledged to support the strategy to enable the country to achieve its transformational agenda.
Source: Ghana News Agency