News

Pres launches 2017/2018 National Report of Ghana Census on Agriculture

Data from the first Agricultural Census conducted in the past 33 years has revealed a sorry state of agriculture in the country.

The data shows agricultural activities in the country are mainly rural and rudimentary with little innovation and modernisation in the sector.

The use of modern tools such as tractors, incubators, hatching and milking equipment are mostly negligible, while crop cultivation is predominantly dependent on rain.

President Akufo-Addo made these revelations when he launched the 2017/2018 National Report of Ghana Census on Agriculture at the Jubilee House in Accra yesterday.

He said the data from the census are expected to form the basis for government’s policies and programmes in the sector and stressed the need for the census to be conducted every decade.

According to him, the census has not been conducted in the past 33 years, with agricultural policies based on guess work. That, he added, has led to systematic decline in agriculture.

While providing the basis to monitor the progress of government’s interventions in the sector, he said the data would offer insight on the transformation of the sector and ensure integration of the agricultural sector and the service sector.

“We now have current and reliable information on the structure of the agricultural sector and obtained the benchmark data on the size, mode of operation and output in aquaculture, fisheries, arable crops, tree crops, livestock and forestry.”

“It is my fervent wish and hope that the Ghana Census on Agriculture would be the beginning of the new cycle of ten-year census as we used to have,” he said.

The findings reveal from the Report that there are 2,585,531 agricultural households in the country, with a population of 11,340,947, with women making up 50.5% of the population, with males making up 49.5 per cent.

Tractors are the most used, according to the report, yet, the least owned equipment.

It further revealed that fertiliser is not used by most holders while the use of pesticides is highly prevalent among holders.

Additionally, the report indicated that the sector remains unfriendly to special interest groups, including persons with difficulty in performing activities and women; the level of education among agricultural holders is low; and the sector, to a large extent, is characterised by consumption of its own produce;

The majority of parcels of land used for the cultivation of crops are smaller than two acres, with the youth, generally, finding agribusiness unattractive.

“From these results, it is clear that agriculture continues to be the anchor of the country’s economy. The data also points to the fact that production methods are not modern, and income levels of farmers and fisher-folk remain low, making the sector unattractive to the youth as a viable means of livelihood,” President Akufo-Addo said.

That is why over the last three years and ten months, through the programme for Planting for Food and Jobs (PFJ), the President said his administration has “begun to change the narrative by modernising agriculture, improving production efficiency, achieving food security, and guaranteeing profitability for our farmers, all aimed at significantly increasing agricultural productivity.”

He said through the Ministry for Food and Agriculture, the government is pursuing a value-addition strategy, aimed at rapidly ramping up agro-processing, and developing new and stable markets for our products.

“PFJ has not only increased substantially the production of maize, rice, soybean and sorghum, and transformed our nation into a net exporter of food, but has also created some two million jobs direct and indirect jobs,” he added.

BY YAW KYEI

Show More
Back to top button