Let’s get our youth interested in agriculture
We have often said that agriculture is the mainstay of the country because most of our working population are engaged in agriculture, while our exports are largely made up of produce from the farms.
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However, all that is about to change, as the fortunes of our agricultural sector have began dwindling steadily, especially as a result of the migration of the youth to the cities in search of non-existent white-collar jobs. For instance, the sector’s contribution to gross domestic product (GDP) had plummeted from 31 per cent in 2009 to 22 per cent by 2013 and was 19 per cent as of November 2015.
Adding to this, the expected growth rate of the sector has changed from the original estimate of 3.6 per cent to 0.04 per cent. The reason for the fall is not far-fetched – not much attention has been given to the sector, although for 31 years running we have been celebrating; no, rather marking a National Farmers Day with a holiday.
It will come to a time that we would no longer have cause to mark a Farmers Day because there would be no farmers to reward, if we do not put in measures now to arrest the falling growth of the agricultural sector.
One very clear contributory factor to the abysmal growth rate of our agricultural sector is the lack of investment. We still depend on subsistence farming that is dependent on rains, so if the rains fail us there is always trouble.
Our farmers are also aging while we have no concrete strategies in place for the youth to take over from them, as farming has been portrayed as a demeaning venture over the years. Contributing to that view, is the fact that while other countries are taking to mechanised farming, we are still depending on rudimentary agriculture with hoes, machetes and doing manual harvesting of crops.
We have not done much of irrigation either, as we rather spill excess water from dams such as the Weija dam in Accra to prevent them from breaking occasionally. Can we not channel such ‘waste’ water into ‘reservoirs’ to water our farms?
Little is also heard of our once famed agricultural colleges such as the Kwadaso Agric College in Kumasi, the Nyankpala Agric College in the Northern Region, the Ejura Agric College in the Ashanti Region and the Ohawu Agric College in the Volta Region, which have produced most of our agric extension officers. How are the youth being motivated to take to agriculture in the senior high schools?
In the previous middle school and even secondary school systems, students were encouraged to take to agriculture by assigning groups plots and agric projects with which they contested for marks, but all that is no more.
To add to this, banks are no longer interested in financing agricultural projects but have rather channelled most of their resources to the services sector because they see the farming business as a high risk area.
Unfortunately, this has led to the country heavily importing food items including poultry and dietary products at great cost and this has even driven the nail deeper into the coffin of the country’s failing agricultural sector.
The Darko, Afariwa and Akropong farms among other poultry and livestock farms that were hitherto household names are now either no more or barely existing because they have to compete with low-cost products from overseas.
If we would continue to be relevant in agriculture, have food on our tables and once again have a vibrant sector, we would need to dedicate resources to revamp it and also deliberately develop policies that would protect the sector from foreign competition and also encourage the youth to take to agriculture.
The time to reflect and take stock of the sector is now, just a day after the National Farmers Day.