Give more credit to farmers – Deputy Minister of Agriculture

Nii Amasah Namoale

The Deputy Minister of Agriculture, Nii Amasah Namoale, has appealed to banks and other financial institutions to provide loans on flexible terms to farmers to help elevate agriculture from peasant to commercial business, so as to ensure productivity in the agricultural sector in Ghana.

He made the call in Accra at a press conference on the first annual focus on agriculture organised by African Connections, an international development and management consulting firm focused on providing development services in enhancing the livelihoods of rural communities in Ghana.

The annual agricultural credit portfolio of banks has fallen from 10 percent in 1985 to less than five percent currently, indicating that banks' financial resources allocation to agriculture has been dwindling steadily over the years.

The Deputy Minister said peasant farmers have taken farming as a way of life, but the time has come for them to be supported to focus on productivity so as to make maximum use of land for profit in order to enhance their standards of living.

Nii Namoale entreated agricultural graduates from the universities and polytechnics to look at commercial agriculture as a business, saying that government is prepared to making mechanised agriculture a national priority. ''Businessmen who go into farming as a business make so much money by focusing. You need not be an agronomist to become a successful commercial farmer," he advised.

He noted the policies of government in enhancing agriculture through the provision of subsidies on agricultural inputs to farmers to enhance productivity, and called on banks and other Financial institutions to emulate ProCredit; One of the sponsors of the upcoming conference in providing loans to farming communities to commercialise agriculture.

Dr. Ayeesha Hakeem, Managing Director of African Connections Ghana Ltd., said the upcoming conference and exhibition in Sunyani on the theme "Focus on Agriculture: Market-Driven Agriculture for Accelerated Rural Economic Development by her organization, in collaboration with the Ministry of Food & Agriculture and Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, is meant to build the capacity of farmer-based organisations to become market-driven, self-sustaining and profitable.

The objectives of the upcoming conference and exhibition, she noted, are to provide a forum for stakeholders to network and explore strategies to improve agricultural productivity and profitability; and encourage smallholder farmers to move toward market-driven, commercially viable agriculture.

The conference, which is targeted at farmer-based orgarnisations and other stakeholders nationwide; will also offer demonstration on the spot corn plantain multiplication process and use of neem extract as pesticides, explore advantages of fish farming to improve smallholder incomes, and introduce technology such as irrigation and organic protocols to improve profitability.