Below are some current developments on Agriculture in Africa:
Agricultural Issues
Farmer Based Organisations’ (FBOs) Website Launched
Hon. Fifi Fiavi Kwetey, the Minister of Food and Agriculture has launched a Farmer Based Organizations’ website in Accra. The launch of the website is part of the efforts at bringing together Farmer Based Organisations (FBOs), apex bodies, farmers and relevant stakeholders and actors along the agricultural value chain unto one common platform for easy dissemination of information and advocacy, the sector Minister, Hon. Kwetey said. The website, www.fboghana.com is expected to help the Ministry provide extension services to farmer groups in a cost effective manner in addition to facilitating the rapid application and adoption of appropriate technology…The design and development of the FBO database and website is part of a broader Australian government funded project known as the “Ghana Farmer-based Organisations Capacity…”
COCOBOD Gets $1.7 billion to Buy Cocoa
International finance institutions have reposed confidence in the Ghanaian economy by offering to lend US$1.7 billion to the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) for the purchase of cocoa beans in the 2014/2015 cocoa season. The level of confidence of the participating banks in Ghana’s economy was reflected in the over-subscription of the loan by 15 percent. Although the board budgeted for and got approval from Parliament to raise US$1.7 billion to fund cocoa purchases, the banks offered to lend it US$1.95 billion, about US$255 million higher than the intended amount… The agreement on the loan, which was syndicated from a consortium of banks from across the world, was signed in Paris, France…The country's reserves were US$4.7 billion in the first quarter of the year but they dropped to US$4.5 billion in July on the back of constant withdrawals to…
FAO Food Price Index Drops to Four - Year Low
The Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) monthly food price index registered another drop in August, continuing a five-month downward run and reaching its lowest level since September 2010. The index's August average of 196.6 points represents a decrease of 7.3 points (3.6 per cent) from July. With the exception of meat, prices for all of the commodities measured by the index dipped markedly…. It said Russia's prohibition at the beginning of the month on imports of dairy products from several countries helped depress prices, while slackening imports of whole milk powder by China (the world's largest importer) also contributed to market uncertainty. FAO's price index for cereals averaged 182.5 points in August, down 2.8 points (1.5 per cent) from last month and 24.2 points (11.7 per cent) versus August 2013.
Encourage Use of Local Raw Materials to Boost Agric Sector
The Corporate Relations Director of Guinness Ghana Breweries Limited (GGBL), Mrs. Preba Greenstreet, has stated that Ghana’s agriculture sector could grow significantly if the manufacturing industry used more local raw materials for production. She said this when she paid a courtesy call on the Minister of Food and Agriculture, Mr. Fiifi Kwetey, in Accra. Mrs. Greenstreet said GGBL, for example, started investing in local raw material sourcing (LRM) over ten years ago but stepped up the level of investment and focus two years ago after the government provided excise duty concession on a sliding scale for beverages produced with local raw materials…. For his part, Fiifi Kwetey, Minister of Food and Agriculture, indicated the government’s commitment to support the development of industries and the entire supply chain to boost the agricultural…
Extension Officers Improve Knowledge on Seeds
Agricultural Extension Agents from seven districts in the three Northern Regions have received training in seed inspection and certification to augment the activities of the Ghana Seed Inspection Division of the Ministry of Agriculture (GSID-MOFA). The initiative is championed by Feed the Future -USAID Agriculture Technology Transfer Project (FTF-USAID-ATT) as part of its project objectives seeks to ensure that seed growers produced high quality seeds for farmers to help increase yield. Mr. Samuel Adzivor, Head of the GSID-MOFA, addressing the closing of the three-day workshop, in Tamale, said the entire northern region had only three seed inspectors and one laboratory personnel, which he maintained was woefully inadequate.
Agric Advancing Slowly but Surely
Ghana is recording “a lot of progress” in agricultural development despite the obvious challenges, the Country Representative of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), Dr. Lamourdia Thiombiano, has said in an exclusive wide-ranging interview with the Business & Financial Times. While this progress may not meet “ideal expectations”, it nonetheless ought to be recognized as the general trend of agricultural development is positive, he said. “There’s an African proverb which says everyone hears the fall of a tree, but when the forest is growing no one hears it. The agricultural sector is exactly the same. When there is an emergency like a drought or a flood, everyone hears it, but when it performs well we take it for granted. So there’s a lot of progress that has been made,” Dr. Thiombiano said.
AGRA Names New President
The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), a leading African agricultural development organization, driving small-holder led agricultural transformation in Africa, has announced a major leadership change. AGRA’s current President, Jane Karuku, has stepped down from her position, after serving as the second president of the organization since its founding in 2007. A statement issued by AGRA on Wednesday and made available to the Ghana News Agency said Dr. Agnes Kalibata, a Board member of AGRA has been named as interim President for the organization. Dr. Kalibata was until recently the Minister of Agriculture and Animal Resources for Rwanda, where she led an agricultural transformation agenda focused on increasing small-holder productivity. This approach yielded impressive results including one of Rwanda becoming food secure…
NGO Improves Forest Governance in Four Regions
Friends of the Earth Ghana (FOE-Ghana), an environmental Non-Governmental Organization, is spending 450,000 euros to help improve forest governance in four regions of the country. With funding from the European Union (EU), FOE-Ghana, in collaboration with the National Working Group on Forest Certification, is implementing the three-year project in 20 forest fringe communities in Ashanti, Eastern, Western and Brong-Ahafo regions. Titled; “Strengthening Civil Society Informal and Private Sector Participation in Forest Law Enforcement and Governance," the project’s specific objective is to improve forest governance by reducing illegal forest harvesting and corrupt practices in the forestry sector. Mr. Nehemiah Tettey Odjer-Bio, Assistant Programme Coordinator of FOE-Ghana, disclosed this at a training programme on the …
Journalists Sensitized on New Trends in Forestry
A three day workshop aimed at sensitizing journalists on forest management in Ghana opened in Accra on Thursday. It is being organized by the Civic Response, a non-governmental organization (NGO) in collaboration with Forest Watch Ghana for 30 journalists drawn from the ten regions. It is being held on the theme “Exploring media entry points for Ghana’s forest laws enforcement, governance and trade/ voluntary Partnership Agreement process. Mrs. Rhoda Panford, Communications Officer of Civic Response said there were a number of interventions in the sector that required citizen’s participation and monitoring. Mrs. Panford noted that the media needed to be sensitized on the governance and management of forest to be better placed to report adequately on the sector. The objectives of the workshop are to enable …
Science, Technology Crucial to Development – Ex-President John Agyekum Kufuor
Former President John Agyekum Kufuor has underscored the relevance of research, science and technology in a nation’s socio-economic development, stressing that the subjects play crucial roles in this competitive world. At the 6th graduation ceremony of the Accra Institute of Technology (AIT) at Cantonments in Accra, he said: “I can see that a time is coming in the not-too-distant future when the might of a nation is not going to be measured by the size of its armaments, armed forces or defence budgets, but rather by the size of its research and development efforts.” … Delivering his address, the President of AIT, Prof. Clement K. Dzidonu, said the doctorate students of AIT were making major strides in research and currently collaborating with a number of international and local partners, including the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Ghana Institute of Engineers and the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), to conduct research in Engineering, Information Technology and Educational Business Administration.
Chief Farmer Cautions Spraying Gangs
Nana Kwesi Ofori, Central Regional Chief Farmer has cautioned cocoa spraying gangs and officials not to divert the free fertilizers and chemicals meant for farmers. He also urged the farmers to track down such miscreants within the mass cocoa spraying exercise to help increase cocoa production in the coming years. Nana Ofori commended government for distributing free fertilizers and urged that the supply of the Akate Master Chemicals for the mass spraying exercise is increased. Mr. Philip Bedzra, the Asikuma-Odoben-Brakwa District Director of the Cocoa Swollen Shoot Virus Disease, in a speech read on his behalf, spelt out the criteria for the free fertilizers to the farmers. He urged the farmers to regularly maintain their farms to increase yields.
Traders Unhappy with Erratic Price Changes
Some traders at the Tema station market on Friday expressed displeasure with the continued price changes of food commodities and said this is affecting the buying rate of customers. The traders in an interaction with Ghana News Agency blamed the situation on the current cedi depreciation. Master Kwesi Twum, a trader said people could not comfortably enjoy tea or any other beverage without incurring so much cost thereby customers have left these commodities to stay on the store shelves. He said the price of one Milo tin is selling at GhȻ10.50 while the whole carton is going for GhȻ126.00 and a tin of Ideal milk is selling at GhȻ5.00 and the carton selling at GhȻ150.00. A carton of Oats is selling at GhȻ80.00 while one tin is going for GHȻ 2.50, a carton of cube sugar is going for GHȻ 54.00 and a carton of Lipton is….
Standards Authority Vows to be Uncompromising on Safety
The Ghana Standards Authority has appealed to exporters and importers to do more to become abreast with the Ghana Conformity Assessment Programme (G-CAP), designed to promote acceptable trade practices. Mr Kwasi Owusu Boadu, Ashanti Regional Director of the GSA, said compliance would help discourage the importation of unsafe, sub-standard and counterfeit products. This way the health and safety of consumers as well as the environment would be protected. Addressing a stakeholders’ consultative forum in Kumasi, he said the G-CAP, which would come into operation on October 1, sought to avoid a situation where the domestic market becomes a dumping ground for non-conforming products. The programme, an initiative of the GSA, is being carried out in line with the World Trade Organization’s (WTO’s) regulations and it …
Government Urged to Subsidize Fertilizer
Nana Yaw Ando, Chief of Fofordor, near Twifo Hemang in the Twifo Hemang Lower District, has called on Government to revert to the policy of subsidizing fertilizers for farmers to help increase cocoa production. Nana Ando said this at a meeting with cocoa farmers, on the need for government to subsidize the prices of fertilizer for all cocoa farmers of all farm sizes and age. He said the introduction of the free fertilizer policy was a lofty programme, but was benefitting only a few. He said the criteria and channel of distributing the fertilizer was rather benefitting people who were not farmers. Nana Ando called on the government to improve on the channel of distribution to ensure that the items are available to all categories of farmers.
Food Security
Africa Rising Farming Project Improves on Production
The Africa Rising Project, a farming project that is introducing new farming technologies and new crop varieties to farmers in the Upper East Region is making progress to improve food security of small holder farmers in the area. This came to light on Friday, when a team of Research Scientists of diverse backgrounds from the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) and the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and Ministry of Food and Agriculture visited some demonstration farms in Bonnia and Nyangua communities in Navrongo in the Kassena Nankana Municipality. At the two communities, good farming practices and the support given to the farmers had led to the improvement of cereal crops such as maize and millet and legumes including beans and cowpea, garden eggs and green leafy vegetables.
Articles/Reports
Assessing Progress Made toward Shared Agricultural Transformation Objectives in Mozambique
T Benson, T Mogues, S Woldeyohannes - 2014
What has been the recent performance of the agricultural sector in Mozambique and the progress made thus far toward achieving the objectives established under the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) initiative for Mozambique that began in late-2011? CAADP promotes agriculture-driven economic growth to reduce hunger, malnutrition, and poverty across Africa. Central to the design of national-level efforts under CAADP is broad ownership and mutual accountability—ownership across a wide range of stakeholders of the process through which priority investments are identified, programs are designed, and action is taken; and mutual accountability for any successes or failures realized in pursuit of CAADP objectives. Mutual accountability here is defined as a process by which the CAADP stakeholders…
Challenges Faced By Small Land Holder Farmer Regarding Decision Making In Innovative Agricultural Development: An Empirical Analysis from Kenya
JM Kavoi, JG Mwangi, GM Kamau - International Journal of Agricultural Extension, 2014
Declining agricultural productivity among smallholder farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa remains a major bottleneck to the continent’s agricultural sector development. In Kenya’s semi-arid lower Eastern region, efforts have been made through public-private partnership (PPP) initiatives to address food insecurity in particular. Inadequate understanding and poor documentation of factors related to challenges facing smallholder farmers in decision making to improve farm productivity and food security exists. A study was carried out to determine the factors related to decision-making among smallholder farmers to increase farm productivity for improved food security. It involved 34 Key Informants (KI) and five Focus Group Discussions. Data were collected using a check-list, a semi-structured questionnaire and a self-administered questionnaire and…
Characterisation of Some Physico-chemical Properties of F5 Breeding Lines of Tomatoes
J Nunoo, ESK Ofori, EK Quartey, EK Gasu, EA Ewusie… - British Journal of Applied …, 2014
In an effort to improve the breeding lines of tomatoes for further breeding work; this work was done to evaluate the physico-chemical properties of selected lines towards further breeding work. The research was carried out between May-September 2012 at Nuclear Agriculture Research Center (NARC) farms and the laboratories of Radiation Technology Center (RTC) of Biotechnology and Nuclear Agriculture Research Institute (BNARI). 10 accessions of fully ripe tomato lines, were harvested and analyzed for their physico-chemical properties including colour, pH, Total Titratable Acidity (TTA), Total Soluble Solids (TSS) and Vitamin C. The highest pH was recorded in wosowoso variety (4.31) while the lowest was 3.90. The Vitamin C content was observed to be high in wosowoso (78.86) and the least being T14 (20.83)…
Enzymatic and Acid Conversion of New Starches from Improved Orphan Crops: Prospects for Renewable Materials Uses in Food and Non-food Industries
G Doué, M Bédikou, G Koua, RM Mégnanou, S Niamké - SpringerPlus, 2014
The enzymatic and acid hydrolysis have converted eight new starches into a range of chain lengths mainly including glucose, maltose, and maltodextrins as observed on TLC plates, irrespective to the starch variety and treatment. Results of the enzymatic hydrolysis have highlighted the possibility of the use of V4 and V64, which can be labelled as “dietary fibres”, to enhance the organoleptic qualities of foods and for fibre fortification of low-calorie products. Concerning V66 and V69, they have much relevant in food, textile and pharmaceutical applications. The acid hydrolysis showed that V73 is the best starch in the chemical industry for making environment-friendly products such as plastics. Because starch is a natural component that degrade quickly in normal composting condition, the whole studied starches could be advised for various…