The chief of Banvim Traditional area, Naa Bapre Banvim-lana Alhaji Mahama Abdulai II has called for a National Dialogue on agriculture to discuss a strategic plan to develop a sustainable mechanism to support genuine and hardworking but needy farmers and Farmer Base Organizations in the country.
He noted that despite successes chalked by the government for the Food and Jobs programme the beginning of the season was not smooth for most farmers, especially for those in the northern part of the country.
Naa Bapre Banvim-Lana in a speech read on his behalf at the 11th Annual pre-harvest exhibition and conference ceremony organized by Agrihouse foundation in Tamale, said some of the factors that impeded the smooth take off of the crop season included the timeliness of availability of inputs and the lack of money to buy the inputs when they became available in the market.
Peasant farmers in particular he indicates were the most affected by this unfortunate situation. The chiefs’ therefore hoped that government will take serious view of this to avert these occurrences in future, so that it does not undermine the successes the government has chalked in revamping Agriculture.
Naa Bapre Banvim-lana who is also a farmer himself further suggested to financial institutions to conduct an imperial research to identify genuine, serious and honest farmers in this part of the country to provide them with adequate and essential support to increase crop production in the country. Naa Bapre Banvim-lana presented a site plan of a Ten acres (10-acres) plot of land registered in the name of Agrihouse Foundation, to begin their work to develop the project. This gesture is in response to the foundation’s request for land for the establishment of a state-of-the-art agricultural training and demonstration center to be named Agrihouse Foundation Agri-Village. The Agri-Village is expected to house seed and livestock farms, production centers conference, workshop halls, exhibition stores, recreational centers, laboratories and research centers.
By: Lilian D. Walter/zaanews.com/Ghana