Open Letter To Ministry Of Education, Ministry Of Food And Agriculture, Ministry Of Fisheries, Ghana Education Service, And All Stakeholders

SCRAPPING OF GENERAL AGRICULTURE SCIENCE AS A SUBJECT FROM THE JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL IS HAVING BAD CONSEQUENCES TOWARD THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURE IN GHANA.

Dear Sir,
I am sad to write you this letter. I am sad because Agriculture which used to be the backbone of development is now being relegated to the dustbin as far as our current Junior High School education is concerned. The situation has also transcended to Senior High Schools and the Universities consequently as a result. Current intake of students to study Agriculture in the Senior High Schools has also declined considerably. It is not surprising that recent figures on growth of Agriculture are very abysmal. Both the Ministry of Food and Agriculture as well as Ministry of Fisheries and Aquaculture.

“Between 2000 and 2013, the production of marine fisheries declined 17%, according to Mininistry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) data. Source: The Finder 28-07-2015.

“Our demand for fish supply outstrips supply by 50%. Government is determined to bridge the 50% deficit through aquaculture development and expansion of fish family farming across the entire coast and inland communities” Source: Highlights of President Mahama State of the Nation Address, By Ghana News Agency- Feb 26, 2015.

The review below was by IMANI Ghana : 2016 Budget Review: Agricultural Sector Neglected.

“ The growth of Agriculture sector for 2015 is 0.04% according to 2016 budget presented by the Minister of Food and Agriculture, Hon Seth Tekper. Source: 2016 Budget.

“The Agricultural Sector has suffered massive neglect. As compared to 2008 when nearly 600 million USD was spent on food imports; in 2014, nearly 1.5 billion USD was spent for importing basic food items including tropical crops such as rice, tomato, palm oil and sugar. In 2013, a whooping 374 million USD was spent alone on rice import.

This year, growth rate of crops hit negative (-1.7%). This figures blatantly points towards a retrogressing agriculture sector in Ghana.

The 2016 Budget Statement with theme “Consolidating Progress towards a brighter medium term” further inflicts mores woes to the sector.

Key Observations:

1. Decline in contribution to GDP

Between 2000-2008, Agricuture contributed an average of 39% to GDP compared to 26 % for industrial sector and 31% for service sector. However, from 2009, there has been a consistent decline. 2009 (31.8%), 2010(29.8%), 2011(25.3%), 2012(22.9%), 2013(22.4%), 2014(21.5%) and 2015(19%).

1. Insignificant Share in Budget

In 2016, a total of 50 billion GHS, the Ministry of Agriculture was allocated equivalent of 1% of the entire budget. The cosistenncy percentage of budgethere to are as follows: 2009(3%), 2012 (1.9%), 2013(1.03%), 2014(1.07%),2015(1.1%) and 2016(1%).

1. Decline in Growth Rate

There has been decline in growth rate from 7.4% in 2008 to 0.04% in 2015. The percentages are as follows: 2009(7.2%), 2010(5.3%), 2011(0.8%), 2012(2.3%), 2013(5.7%), 2014(4.6%) and 2015(0.04%). .....Source: IMANI Ghana ,December 8, 2015.

I have spent five years in the classroom, teaching Integrated Science and I believe, having a firsthand information in the educational sector, in is important to add my voice to the declining Agricultural Sector and what can be done, focusing on re-introduction of General Agricultural Science into the Junior High School.

I will want to go over the current Integrated Science Syllabus for Junior High School. I am doing this because I know the first reaction of many will be that the General Agriculture Science has been infused into the current Integrated Science. An analogy which is not supported with facts on the ground. Here are the topics in the current Syllabus:

SOURCE: INTEGRATED SCIENCE SYLLABUS, SEPTEMBER 2012, CRDD/ GES/ MOE

Recent review of the syllabus in September 2012 saw the scraping of the following topics from the Integrated Science Syllabus.

Unit 3: Fish Culture
Unit 3: Digestion in Animals
Unit 2: Animal Production
Unit 2: Technology and Development
Unit 3: Machinery
Unit 4: Entrepreneurship
So as it stands, from the table above, the Agriculture component of the current Integrated Science Syllabus are:

Unit 4: Nature of Soil
Unit 3: Pests and Parasites
Unit 1: Life Cycle of Flowering Plants
Unit 2: Vegetable Crop Production
The effect is that, students in Junior High School barely have negligible knowledge in Agriculture. This situation will motivate such a students to choose Agriculture Science as a programme to study at the Senior High School. I want us to take a look at the Junior Secondary School General Agriculture Science which was scraped off in 2008:

A critical look at the topics shows by the end of the above lessons for three years, the student will be in a good position as to what to study at the Senior High School.

Apart from just the knowledge, such students is likely to involve himself or herself in Animal rearing, fish farming and crop production, especially for those students who are unable to further their education at the Senior High School due to poverty and lack of access.

The 2008 Educational Reforms sought to improve Science and Technology, and therefore, introduced subjects such as Information Communication Technology (ICT) at the expense of General Agriculture.

The big question is, Agriculture in its own is technology. So why was it scraped? And can we eat computers? The answer is a big no. Developing technology does not mean we should collapse the foundation of Agriculture in the country.

The fact still remains that, without quality human resource to develop Agriculture sector, the future of our country is doomed, and you cannot get such human resource when our children and siblings are, right from the start, made to believe that Agriculture Science is not so significant in the country.

After discovery of oil in commercial quantities in this country, it was proposed that effort should be made to encourage livelihood empowerment programme and that Agriculture should be developed especially for coastal communities whose livelihood like fishing is going to be impeded due to oil exploration.

Following establishment of fisheries campus by the University of Cape Coast in the Central Region, effort must be made to develop all aspect of Agriculture especially at the Junior High School. This can be achieved if Agriculture Science is re-introduced at Junior High School.

We must work hard to resurrect collapsing Agriculture. And Education is the key to development of such Agriculture. We must therefore, as a country, go back to re-introduce the General Agriculture Science as a subject once again in the Junior High School.

FRANCIS MIKE ESHUN
BSc (AGRICULTURE),U.C.C-2009, Dip in Ed, U.E.W-K-2014

TUTOR, PRESTEA SENIOR HIGH TECHNICAL SCHOOL
Email: [email protected]
Mob: 0203961833
CC:
Ministry of Communication
University of Cape Coast