Stakeholders in agriculture sector have called on government to invest in the sector to boast production and ensure Ghana becomes self-sufficient.
Agriculture stakeholders are expecting the first Mahama-government budget to be presented by the Finance Minister, Dr. Ato Forson on Tuesday, March 11, 2025, to be a breakthrough for Ghana in the sector.
Speaking in an interview with Onua News ahead of the Tuesday’s budget presentation, the Chief Executive Officer for Oro Oil Ghana Limited, Maxwell Commey, said the government must support the private sector to go into large scale farming.
He said they presented five key areas in agriculture to the Ministry of Finance for consideration into the 2025 budget.
“Government must invest in agriculture because farming has gone down. Cocoa production has dropped from 1 million metric tons to 400 metric tons, so we must go into large scale farming. If large scale farming become 80%, it can ensure the value of our currency”, Mr. Commey explained.
The CEO said “land bank is also important. Our land tenure system has not been helpful and government must intervene for farming to enable them have access to litigation free lands for agriculture”.
Speaking on access to funds by farmers, Mr. Commey said “accessibility to funding as a farmer is very difficult. Banks demand collateral from farmers who do not have such collaterals, and this is impeding our progress”.
He explained that “there are no insurance systems for farming. No insurance company is willing to insure our farms and so if the farmer invests in his or her farm and any act of God affects the farm, the farmer runs at loss”.
Mr. Commey said the last proposal to the Finance Ministry was for the government to tackle the “long term policies that have been put in place”.
He said these are several policies ranging from small, medium and long term but normally, successive governments tackle only the medium and short term and leave the long due to instability”.
Mr. Commey, who is into palm oil production and export said, “the demand for palm oil is high but it is the cheapest oil globally”.
The business mogul advised the youth to go into agribusiness, stressing that there are diverse job opportunities in the sector.
He wants the youth to take advantage of government’s incentive packages inherent in the sector to improve their future.
The Chief Executive Officer wondered why farming has been left to the aged.
“Agriculture is not for the aged. It is for the young people, and it is time the youth are encouraged to take over the sector to help better their lot,” he said.
“The perception that persons engaged in farming are poor, unskilled and uneducated needs to be changed and the youth are the ideal catalyst; given their erudition and the concept of technology in farming, he re-emphasized.
Mr Commey appealed to the government to introduce innovative interventions like what he described as Land Bank, where government would procure lands from the chiefs to enhance its accessibility to the farmers.
He believes the move will encourage large scale farming as well as making farming attractive to the youth.
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https://3news.com/news/2025-budget-will-blow-the-minds-of-ghanaians-edudzi-tameklo/
