A group of journalists are worried about the deteriorating fortunes of Ghanaian farmers.
The Ghana Agricultural & Rural Development Journalists Association (GARDJA) believes government can do more in reducing the troubles of farmers by introducing a system where weighing scales are employed in determining prices of food stuffs at the market.
“Today, farmers are hoping that governmental efforts will be made for weighing scales to be applied in determining the prices of food stuffs at the market, and we are adding our voices to the call.
Members of GARDJA believe that such mechanism, if put in place, will ensure that farmers receive fair prices to make the farming attractive to young people since the current farmers are aging.This will, invariably, also improve personal livelihoods in the rural communities and increase food production for the country.”
The group wants government to pay more attention to agriculture to make it more attractive to the youth of the country since it is the “backbone of Ghana’s economy”.
The Journalists urge government to as a matter of urgency turn things round by “offering incentives such as subsidizing agriculture inputs such as pesticides, while securing internal and external markets for their produce since it has come to our knowledge that government is not offering the required support in that direction.”
Read full statement below:
LET’S MAKE AGRICULTURE ATTRACTIVE
It has become increasingly common to hear our farmers complaining about their inability to sell their produce at reasonable prices.
Farmers in this country sell their produce all at once and at any price because they do not have financial capacity to store them, and this gives merchants more control over prices.
We at Ghana Agricultural & Rural Development Journalists Association (GARDJA) are worried about the future of agriculture which is considered to be the backbone of Ghana’s economy at this momentous time when the youth of this nation keep on running away from farming and its ancillary works.
The complaints of farmers about low prices for their produce give us more headaches and that Government needs to take some practical measures to shore up Ghana’s ailing agriculture production.
Today, farmers are hoping that governmental efforts will be made for weighing scales to be applied in determining the prices of food stuffs at the market, and we are adding our voices to the call.
Members of GARDJA believe that such mechanism, if put in place, will ensure that farmers receive fair prices to make the farming attractive to young people since the current farmers are aging.
This will, invariably, also improve personal livelihoods in the rural communities and increase food production for the country.
There is an overarching concern in recent time that young people are shunning the agriculture sector as they see farming as a labour intensive and low profit-making venture.
It is government’s responsibility to make things turn around, and this could be done through offering incentives such as subsidizing agriculture inputs such as pesticides, while securing internal and external markets for their produce since it has come to our knowledge that government is not offering the required support in that direction.
Thank you
Richmond Frimpong
President
0268909020
Ernest Kofi Adu
General Secretary
0243165584
