This year’s International Fish Festival slated for November 24 and 25 will be held at the Black Star Square in Accra, Mrs Mavis Hawa Koomson Minister for Fisheries and Aquaculture Development, has disclosed.
She said the event would be marked with a durbar of chiefs and chief fisher men, exhibition of fishing and aquaculture inputs, fish products as well as a panel discussion on topical issues in the sector.
Mrs Koomson made the disclosure in an address read for her during this year’s International Food Day at Sogakope in the South Tongu District of the Volta Region.
This year’s celebration was on the theme: “Leave No One Behind, Better Production, Better Nutrition, Better Environment and Better Life.”
The Minister said the festival would provide an opportunity to show case the importance of the sector to national development, deliberate and explore solutions to the challenges confronting the sustainable management of the fisheries resources.
She said the Fisheries Ministry was working to sustain the fisheries and aquaculture sector for the current and future generations by ensuring production of quality fish for consumption and protection of the environment.
Mrs Koomson said the Ministry attached a worth of importance to the celebration of the World Food Day and had participated fully over the years and this demonstrated the Ministry’s pursuit of ameliorating poverty, malnutrition and hunger.
She said fisheries enforcement operations had been intensified to ensure compliance to fisheries laws and combat illegal fishing practices, emphasising that MoFAD had shown its unflinching stance to clump down on illegal operators and prosecute them for infractions through the law courts.
“However, we continue to engage fishers to voluntarily comply with relevant laws with the hope to achieve sustainable fisheries resource management and safeguard livelihoods of persons engaged in the value chain,” she added.
She said healthy diets and better nutrition was fundamental to ending poverty, achieving better quality of life, developing human capital and national development.
Mr Seth Kwasi Agbi, District Chief Executive for South Tongu called for adoption of better productive methods which would translate into produce with required nutrients for a healthy life.
He said government’s flagship projects including Planting for Food and Jobs, Planting for Export and Rural Development and distribution of subsidised fertilizers and high yielding vegetable seedlings to farmers were meant to increase productivity and drive the country’s development agenda.
The DCE said the district was ripe for investment and therefore urged business community to invest in the district, adding that the district had vast fertile arable land, and the people were also willing to venture into commercial farming.
Source: GNA