The Mion District Director of Ministry of Food Agriculture (MOFA), Mr Abednego Abosore is urging government to support farmers in the area to go into large scale rice farming. The area he said is blessed with viable valleys good for the cultivation of rice for commercial purposes.
Addressing farmers at the 31st Edition of National Farmers’ Day celebration at Sambu, Mr. Asobore appealed to government toconsider the Mion district as one with a comparative advantage in rice and yam production in the country.
The Mion district, according to the MOFA director, has fertile lands good for the production of yam with many farmers willing to cultivate both rice and yam on a large scale. He, therefore, urged government to invest more in road infrastructure in order to reduce transactional cost and increase efficiency in private sector operations.
The access roads, he added, will open up the farming communities to market centers. Investing in agriculture Mr. Abosore observed can reduce rural-urban migration to southern Ghana for kayaye.
He listed the major challenges facing farmers in the area; inadequate tractors, lack of combine harvesters and appealed to government to assist the district with more combine harvesters for quick harvesting of rice.
Rice farmers this year Mr. Abosore said were supported with inputs on credit by the Export Development and Agriculture Investment (EDAIF) for 563 acres of paddy rice in the Mion district.
A number of drought tolerant and striga tolerant varieties of maize which can cope with the unpredictable weather were also introduced to farmers through MOFA and its partners such as CRS and IITA.
The Mion MOFA director told the farmers that, traditional farming, that is, hoe and cutlass agriculture cannot produce enough food to feed the country, hence the need for farmers to adopt modern agricultural practices.
The District Chief Executive for Mion, Dan Makandan who presented the overall best farmer to him reiterated the NDC government commitment to invest in the agriculture sector to transform Ghana’s rural economy.
In all, 25 deserving farmers including two women were rewarded for their contributions to food production in the country. 52 year-old Mpuagban Lamark from Lamarkdo community was adjudged the best Mion district farmer.
He went home with a brand new Apsonic 125 motorbike, certificate, knap-sack sprayer, radio set among others. Northern Regional best farmer went to Alhaji Hussein Muhib Khama while the National best farmer went to Ibrahim Musah. He went home with 3 thousand Ghana cedis cheque, a laptop, a car among other prizes.