Cocoa Farmers Worried Over Gov't's Distribution Of Insecticides

Some cocoa farmers in the Ahafo Ano South district of the Ashanti Region are unhappy with government’s free distribution of cocoa insecticides to farmers in the area.

One of the leaders of farmers, Nana Kwame Boating, speaking to Gardja, complained that the insecticides are woefully inadequate to meet their demands.

Nana Kwame Boateng, who is a farmer at Berebro near Adu Gyama, with 14 acres of cocoa plantation, explained that the farmers were zoned into groups and each member given one liter of insecticide.

He said black pod and capsid disease have become widespread in the area and requires more insecticides to fight these diseases, and lamented the liter of insecticide cannot sustain the effort of the farmers.

He said it would be helpful, if government cannot supply enough insecticides to farmers, and on time, to make them readily available on the market for those who can afford it to go in for it.

He said "government should prioritize the agric sector in order to curtail the growing unemployment rate in the country."

He said over the last couple of years, there has been a fall in the annual cocoa production due to the inability of farmers to access to the free cocoa spraying exercise which was introduced during the erstwhile Kufour administration.

The cocoa spraying exercise, in the past, boosted cocoa yield in the country to about one million tonnes,

Richmond Frimpong