The Ashanti regional secretariat of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) is placing emphasis on cash crop production as part of efforts to reduce poverty and increase foreign exchange earnings for the country.
The regional MoFA is currently focusing on the planting of cash crops such as coconut, cashew, oil palm, mango and others, and has since 2018, distributed a total of 8,132,515 seedlings of varied cash crops to farmers and institutions to plant in the region.
Reverend Dr John Manu, Regional Director of Agriculture, who made this known said the region was taking advantage of the government’s Planting for Export and Rural Development (PERD) initiative to increase cash crop production to help improve incomes of farmers and reduce poverty in region.
Speaking to the Ghana News Agency in an interview ahead of the 39th national farmers’ day celebrations, he said over three million seedlings of cashew alone had been distributed to farmers within the last five years.
All these activities, he explained
, were intended to project and support the government’s policies of boosting agricultural production to increase exports, reduce poverty among farmers and stabilize the economy.
Rev. Dr Manu said the Planting for Food and Jobs had benefited many farmers adding that between 2017 and 2022, almost one million farmers in Ashanti had benefitted from the initiative.
He said as part of efforts to develop a competitive and more efficient livestock industry that increased domestic production, reduced importation of livestock products and contributed to employment generation, over 1,100 piglets had been distributed to about two hundred farmers in the region.
Again, out-breeder sheep farmers have received 815 sheep whereas the Ejura Breeding Station has been given 613 sheep to breed for onward distribution to farmers.
A total of 40,000 broilers were supplied and distributed to 19 poultry farmers to expand production.
Rev. Dr. Manu reiterated the role agriculture played in ensuring food security and reducing poverty
among others, saying the role agriculture played during the COVID-19 pandemic was an ample testimony of the crucial role of the sector.
He, therefore, urged Ghanaians to continue to support the government’s efforts at making the sector attractive enough to help create jobs and ensuring socio-economic development.
On the Greenhouse Technology Development House Village Module, the MoFA Rev. Dr Manu said vegetables produced in the greenhouse at Akumadan were in higher demand on the domestic market.
The facility, he said, sold high-quality vegetables to shopping malls and restaurants across the country.
Source: Ghana News Agency