A/R farmers undergo training in citrus cultivation
The Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA), in collaboration with MASHAV, an Israeli international development cooperation agency, and the German International Cooperation (GIZ), has organised a one-week training of trainers’ workshop for extension officers and citrus producers from the Ashanti Region.
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The workshop, dubbed ‘Advanced training in citrus production and bee-keeping,’ formed part of the trilateral cooperation between Ghana, Israel and Germany and was aimed at boosting the production of citrus in the country.
Participants
In all, 70 participants, drawn from 21 districts in the region, took part in the training, which exposed the farmers and extension officers to advanced methods of citrus farming, integrated crops, pest management, and marketing of produce.
It was the second of such training for the farmers and agricultural extension officers since the collaboration started in 2012.
The participants were also introduced to bee-keeping, which, according to Dr Shaike Stern, an Israeli agronomist, also helped in boosting the yield from the orchards since the bees serve as pollinators.
Alternative
Aside from that, Dr Stern said the farmers could use the honey as an alternative source of income and sell the wax from the beehives, which can be used for making candles.
He said the bee farms had other uses besides production of honey and wax and that some of the byproducts such as pollen and propolis were also useful in the pharmaceutical industry.
Benefits
Mrs Emelia Monney, Director of Agriculture at the MoFA, said the collaboration would also help the government in its drive to promote the consumption of fruits by Ghanaians and could be used to feed the juice factories to grow the economy.
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The Senior Technical Advisor of GIZ, Mr Samuel Kwame Sackey, explained that the cooperation was to enhance the farmers and the extension officers’ knowledge in citrus production and also enable them to impart the knowledge to their peers.
He said with the inclusion of bee-keeping as an alternative income-generating activity, there was the hope that more farmers would include it in their farming activities to enable them to earn more income
.
Cooperation
In a speech read on her behalf, the Israeli Ambassador to Ghana, Mrs Sharon Bar-li, said the trilateral cooperation should be considered as an example of the potential that existed in joining forces.
“The collaboration was between Ghana’s MoFA, Israeli know-how and expertise, and the German government’s support.
Though still in its initial stage, the collaboration, she said, should be further exhausted under the ‘Africa Initiative’ document that was signed between Germany and Israel with regard to collaboration in the field of agricultural development in African countries.