Abandoned In The Bush, Rotten By The Roadside, Our Farmers, Their Citrus, Our Nightmares

The Author

I have been doing my usual morning walks across the streets of my fatherland for the past 3 years aimed at shedding of some flesh. I do these mostly on Sunday mornings when I haven't travelled outside my beautiful hometown of Asebu. I am a proud fante from Asebu, the home of ekutu and amkama ( oranges and lime).

In fact, the entire Abura Asebu Kwamankese district is noted for the production of citrus. According to the Agricultural extension services census, the Abura Asebu Kwamankese District is the number one producer of oranges in the entire country. We have over 2,000 registered citrus farmers and about 7,000 unregistered.

These farmers produce about 1,288,000 tons of citrus fruits annually ( 2014), on a total citrus farm size of about 46,000 acres in the district.

On average, each citrus tree bears about 500 fruits when it is taken care of by the farmer and there are two citrus seasons( major and minor).

*NATIONAL CITRUS STATISTICS*
According to www.fact fish.com , in 2015, about 736,875 tons of citrus fruits were produced in Ghana, in 2016, 740,345 tons were produced.

There is therefore a huge potential for Ghana with my District leading the rest of the country to *Citrumania*.

Tracking back to my Sunday morning jogs, it was my saddest as I watched the two kilometer stretch littered with rotten oranges and lime.

I thought about our parents, their pride in the number of acreages they have, their livelihood and their entire economy, CRUSHED😭😭, rotten livelihood.

They toiled to tile the land.
They laboured to care for their plants,
They contracted loans to buy pesticides and all the things that needed to be done to make sure they have their own share of the bumper harvest!

God hearkened their prayers, the orange trees have sagged due to the heaviness of the fruits.

There has been a collective harvest at the various farms, they have contracted the women to carry them to the road side but unfortunately, the company that promised to buy the fruits, has failed to show up!

Two weeks gone by, the fruits never got picked so its rotten! Several tons of oranges rotten by the road side as I sadly walked by almost every 100 metre walk by the roadside lay abandoned oranges or lime with their lives taken out of them and left to rot!

They were meant to be processed into various fruit juices but they never got to fulfilled their God-given destinies of being packaged to help cure mankind of hunger or help give their owners their livelihood.

The citrus fruits that once gave our fathers the needed funds to pay our school fees.

The citrus fruits that once help and still hope to help build our fathers home and put roof over our heads has failed to lighten up!

The citrus fruits that once gave our fathers their second wives, has once again failed to shine!

The citrus fruits that served as a guarantor of the future of our fathers children and gave long life is now giving our fathers heartaches.

Mr. Minister of Agriculture, our fathers are cutting down the citrus plants, they are replacing them with bankye ( cassava) or aburow ( maize). Our fathers are losing faith in the citrus plant.

So I set out together with a good friend of mine to have a stakeholders meeting at the odomankoma palace of Asebu in the presence of the Omanhen, Okatakyi Dr. Amanfi VII. we all went home crying!

No hope! No future. The factory that promised to pick these fruits owed the farmers huge sums of money for the past 6 months. The factory is sited some 100km away in the eastern region. There is no communication and my fathers would have to travel all the way to Asamankese only to be told there is no money so *go and come check next week*. Too many of the next week promises is leading to series of mortalities amongst our fathers and our farmers. They are in trouble. Their debtors are after them.

Some are hiding in their farms, others have abandoned their farms and travelled because they can't face the disgrace.

The citrus plant was our hope but now it is our nightmare!

Our citrus farms have now grown weeds as farmers have given up on them but it seems the plants have continued to have hope in their owners as I entered into the farm by the roadside, a few metres to Asebu, I saw the wind blow these abandoned farm leaves and the power of the wind was unable to turn the branches because they were all pregnant!

Even in their abandonment, the plants haven't given up on their farmers. They are laden with fruits waiting to be plucked by their farmers.

The plants are uncared for by their owners because they have given up due to lack of a buyer but the plants haven't given up on their owners.

They want to help the owners pay their debts but the buyers are not anywhere to be found.

Very sad to see one of the farmers hack down 5 acres of the innocent and humble serving citrus fruits, out of his total of 20 acre citrus farm.

Mr. Agric ministers, my fathers are killing the citrus plants. As I write this I have tears in my eyes because I can't sleep over what I have experience over the weekend.

The children of my fathers are migrating to kaneshie to push wheelbarrows. One of them asked his father, what shall it profit him ( the son) to be going to tend for these fruits when at the end of the day, there wouldn't be a buyer?

The ivoriens used to come with their trucks, but they owe my fathers so much that they have stopped coming.

I shouting out to the whole world that the good oranges that used to serve us are being given a shabby treatment!

I am shouting out to the whole country that my fathers, our farmers and their farms in pain. Their oranges are rotten, their debts are rising and the death rate is rising amongst these farmers.

The Abura Asebu Kwamankese enclave alone needs not less than 3 citrus processing factories. Mandis located on the southern part of the town needs a strong revival.

Coastal, situated on the Abakrampa road has been taken over by reptiles!

Kudos to my brother, my friend and my uncle Kow Sam. He donated 10 machines that can be used to remove *mistletoes*

He further pledged to establish the *CENTRAL CITRUS FACTORY* to help give hope to my fathers.

My dear readers kindly help me thank my Brother Kow Sam for the new hope.

My government, kindly help my brother to give this new hope to the farmers.

We would be training the first batch of volunteers this morning at Asebu on how to use the machines!

In subsequent weeks, we would roll out a roadmap for weeding the farms of our fathers. We shall fight for our fathers and their farms and we shall stand shoulder to shoulder with them.

We shall bring back the smiles on their faces and we shall roll out the youths into the citrus business.

Most of these farmers are in their 60s,70s and 80s!

Our fathers, their farms, our livelihood and our poor district must see a new hope for our future. We shall create our own prosperity using our citrus and processing our citrus both for the local market and the international market.

God bless my fathers and their farms.
Kofi Karikari-Bondzie
Asebu.