A Drip Irrigated Demonstration Farm Project to facilitate an all-year–round food crops production was yesterday inaugurated at Aviation, a suburb in the La Nkwantanang Madina Municipality of the Greater Accra region.
The demonstration farm has been planted with over 30,000 seedling varieties, including maize, Tomato and other vegetables, and it is expected to be harvested within 12 weeks.
The drip irrigation system is a cost-efficient form of irrigating fields due to its use of gravity in the slow release of water to the roots of the crops, thus minimising wastage.
It also enables an all-year-round production of crops, the highly improved gravity micro irrigation system can also be used for “fertigation”, thus ensuring the efficient utilisation of both water and fertiliser and also saves time and labour cost.
The project, spearheaded by N. Drip, an Israeli irrigation company and Agricultural Manufacturing Group (AMG), a Ghanaian company, is to provide alternative measures to rain-fed agriculture and flood irrigation to enable farmers adopt precise and sustainable solutions to the country’s food security challenges.
The Managing Director of AMG, Henry Otoo-Mensah, speaking at the ceremony, said technology was the practical application of scientific knowledge towards addressing the numerous challenges confronting humanity.
According to him, the internet had provided a huge reservoir of knowledge that could be harnessed to address the challenges of the world, especially the issue of food security.
Ghana’s population as per the 2021 population and housing census report, he said stood at 30.8 million people, while the United Nations had estimated that by July 1, 2022, Ghana’s population could rise further to about 32.4million people.
He added that the “UN has also projected that the global population could hit 9.7 billion people by 2050 which implies that a lot more mouths will have to be fed while the size of arable lands available continues to decline at a high rate.”
Mr Otto Mensah expressed his company’s resolve to contribute its quota towards addressing the issues of food security, hence, the decision to collaborate with the Israeli company, N-DRIP towards a mutually beneficial and a more socially impactful farming system.
The Israeli Ambassador to Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone, Ms Shlomit Sufa, commended the Trade and Economic Mission of the Embassy for initiating programmes to promote Ghana’s agricultural activities which she said would provide employment opportunities for the people.
Mr Jacques Blinbaum of N.Drip said the system would be used to produce
all-year-round food for the vegetable markets as a result of the expected better yield.
The Deputy Director of Crop Services of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, George Prah, urged the two companies to document their activities in order to replicate the programme in other parts of the country.
BY LAWRENCE VOMAFA-AKPALU
