Bolgatanga Municipal Assembly Inaugurates Management Team For Agriculture Census

The Bolgatanga Municipal Assembly has inaugurated its management team for the Agriculture census to oversee the collection, processing, publishing and dissemination of information on the structure of agriculture and the state of development in rural areas within the Municipality.

The team made up of; Mr Abass Ketigwie, the Municipal Coordinating Director, Mr William Kumi, Assistant Director, Dr Bernard My-Issah, the Municipal Director for the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA), Mr Abdul Jalal Fuseini and Mr Karl Kubuga who are both Planning Officers at the Assembly.

The rest are; Mr Amadu Abubakari, the Municipal Budget Officer, Mr Roland Abire, the Presiding Member for the newly created Bolgatanga East District Assembly and Madam Felicia Fatima Mijimah, the Municipal Information Officer.

The team would cover both the Bolgatanga Municipal and Bolgatanga East District.

The exercise which is organised by the Ghana Statistical Service, in collaboration with MoFA and other partners, would receive technical support from the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations.

Speaking to the Ghana News Agency after a brief ceremony to inaugurate the team, Mr Joseph Amiyuure, the Bolgatanga Municipal Chief Executive (MCE) said the census of agriculture would involve detailed gathering of data in every aspect of agriculture in the Municipality and would last for four years.

He said the project was divided into four phases; the preparatory phase, where all preparations would be done, the enumeration phase which involves recruitment of enumerators to do the enumeration within the various catchment areas, and added that this phase encompassed everything about agriculture.

Amiyuure indicated that detailed information on crops and livestock, were part of phase three which would undertake surveys on horticulture production, fertilizer usage, forestry, post-harvest losses and fisheries, would be administered to sampled population to collect more information.

He said the final phase would involve the preparation of technical reports and dissemination of results of the comprehensive and thematic modules, and urged officials executing the exercise to gather accurate data to enable policy makers to target areas of need.

Dr My-Issah the MofA Director, disclosed that 40 people were selected for the exercise after about 100 applications were received and forwarded to Accra, while about 10 were on a waiting list. 'These 40 went through a 10-day training, with series of assessments, based on which 36 people were selected,' he said.

He indicated that there were six sites to be covered, hence the decision to select 36 people so that six could be deployed to cover a site at a time, 'they have been given all the logistics to aid them pick the data.'

The Director said more sensitisation among community members would be done to ensure that they cooperated to enable a smooth process.

GNA