‘No food shortage this year and 2016’
Ghana will not experience any food shortage this year and in 2016 in spite of the change in the rainfall patterns across the country, the Northern Regional Director of Agriculture, Mr William Boakye Acheampong, has stated.
"I can tell you that farmers have worked tirelessly to ensure a steady increase in food production in the country so there will not be any food shortage this year in spite of the delays of the rains, especially up north, this year," he stated.
Mr Acheampong said this in an interview with the Daily Graphic in Tamale.
He noted that farmers up north increased their production marginally, "so I do not foresee any shortage of food this year and the ensuing year."
Rice production
Mr Acheampong stated that Ghana had also crossed the half mark to meet its rice production locally and added that the country is currently producing 56 per cent of the rice being consumed locally, "so we are gradually inching towards rice sufficiency."
He commended the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and other development partners for their interventions in the agriculture sector to ensure that Ghana attained food security and also that incomes of farmers were increased to reduce poverty, especially in northern Ghana.
Some farmers who shared their experiences with the Daily Graphic said they continued to rely on rain for farming but good agricultural practices and the adoption of new technologies, coupled with the provision of quality improved seeds, had increased their production.
Jambedu Abu, a maize farmer from the Upper East Region, said through the interventions under the USAID project he was able to harvest a total of 1,700 bags of maize from 125 acres last year and expressed the hope that production will increase to 2,000 bags this year.
He noted that farmers only needed an irrigation system to go into all-year-round farming, since after harvesting for the major season they had to wait for the next crop season, which is almost after a year, and that affected their incomes.
