Members of the Assinman Co-operative Cocoa Farmers and Marketing Limited have voiced strong objections to the current structure of the Cocoa Farmers Pension Scheme, which is currently being piloted in the Assin Fosu Cocoa District.
Kwabena Assan Mends, speaking on behalf of the farmers, questioned why the government’s contribution to the farmers’ pension scheme is set at just 1%, compared to the standard 13.5% typically allocated to government employees.
The Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) began the pilot phase of the pension scheme’s deduction process on August 6, 2024. This trial is designed to test real-time deductions before the scheme’s full implementation, which is scheduled to start on October 1, 2024, during the peak crop season.
The farmers are requesting increased stakeholder consultation prior to the scheme’s nationwide launch, urging COCOBOD to address their issues and provide more detailed information.
Additionally, Robert Enyan, the 2015 Central Regional Best Farmer, along with other farmers, has called for more transparency on key aspects of the scheme, including the process for selecting next of kin and other personal details.
Ghanaian cocoa farmers are anticipating a recovery in the 2024/2025 season, starting in October, following a significant drop in production this season that has driven global cocoa prices to unprecedented highs.
This season, Ghana experienced one of its worst harvests in a decade due to severe weather from El Niño, extensive smuggling, and swollen shoot disease.
An increase in cocoa production would not only benefit Ghana’s economy but also support the global chocolate industry, which has been facing supply shortages.
Over two dozen cocoa farmers, COCOBOD officials, and buyers predict a rebound in output next season, thanks to improved weather conditions and efforts to rehabilitate areas affected by disease and illegal gold mining.
Despite this optimism, swollen shoot disease remains a significant issue, with the International Cocoa Organisation estimating that most of one of Ghana’s key cocoa-growing regions is still affected.
Nevertheless, farmers in several cocoa-growing areas have reported that rainfall has been timely and well-distributed with periods of sunshine since March, creating favorable conditions for cocoa flowering and pod development.
“This year really looks great. I have not seen pods this much since 2020 and I see harvest being better next season,” said George Opoku Koduah, a cocoa farmer in Ghana’s western south Prestea district, a major cocoa growing area.
Koduah said he expected raise output to 1,000 in 2024/25 from 600 bags harvested this season if he could prevent black pod disease attack by August – when it often strikes.
Theophilus Tamakloe from central Ghana’s Assin Fosu community said he expected to harvest 400 to 600 bags of cocoa next season after he harvested 180 bags this season, judging from the pods on his farm.
However, farmers said they remained concerned abut inadequate fertilizer and pesticides supply, low wholesalecocoa prices, delayed payments and bean smuggling.
Fertilizer and pesticides
Ghana’s cocoa regulator supplies farmers with pesticides, fungicides and other chemicals but farmers in eastern Ghana’s Volta and Oti regions said delays in fertilizer and pesticide supplies contributed to low harvests during the past two seasons.
Stephen Mensah, a cocoa farmer from Likpe Agborzume in eastern Ghana, reported that due to tight supplies, he could only apply the recommended black pod-curing fungicide to his two-hectare farm once a month instead of every two weeks.
A COCOBOD spokesperson explained that while the regulator has ample chemicals in stock, distribution is based on need to prevent misuse, smuggling, and hoarding.
Ghana typically finances cocoa bean purchases through an annual syndicated loan arranged at the beginning of the season in October. However, this season’s loan faced delays, with COCOBOD ultimately securing only $600 million of the $800 million initially agreed upon.
Licensed cocoa buyers noted that insufficient funding has contributed to smuggling in border areas with Togo and Ivory Coast, where cocoa prices are more than double Ghana’s farmgate price.
Nana Johnson Mensah Kagya, a major farmer in Ghana’s western south region with around 80 hectares of plantations, said he feared output recovery would be eroded by smuggling, which reduces the officially reported output, and consequently funds allocated for regulated bean purchases.
Cocoa farmers have received a call to prioritize the pruning of their farms to boost cocoa tree yields.
Niikoe Kotey, Atwima Nwabiagya Cocoa Officer, emphasized that pruning is essential to prevent diseases, pests, and parasites that could weaken cocoa trees.
Therefore, farmers need to regularly undertake pruning activities to ensure optimal growth and fruit-bearing.
Mr. Kotey delivered this message during a training workshop for selected cocoa farmers at Anyinamso, near Nyinahin in the Atwima Mponua district of the Ashanti region.
The workshop was organized by the Atwima Nwabiagya Municipal Office of the Cocoa Health and Extension Division of COCOBOD in collaboration with FEDCO Ghana Limited, a licensed Cocoa Buying company in the area.
Its objective was to equip farmers with the necessary skills to prune cocoa trees effectively, aiming for increased crop yields.
Mr. Kotey emphasized that proper and timely tree pruning leads to higher bean production, increased profits, and improved livelihoods for farmers.
He encouraged farmers to apply the knowledge gained and to share it with their peers who did not attend the training.
Similar training sessions were conducted for farmers in Nweneso in the Amansei West district.
The recent rise in cocoa farmgate price by the government has drawn criticism from the Ghana National Cocoa Farmers Association, who deem it insufficient.
On April 5, 2024, the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) declared a 58.26 percent increase, establishing the price at GH¢33,120 cedis per ton for the 2023/2024 crop season. This adjustment aims to equitably allocate the benefits of the escalating global cocoa prices and discourage cocoa bean smuggling.
However, Stephenson Anane Boateng, President of the Ghana National Cocoa Farmers Association, argues that cocoa farmers are being treated unjustly.
In response to COCOBOD’s decision, Anane Boateng stated, “Cocoa has been raised globally to $10,000 per metric ton. So if you compare, and you convert to our currency, it is running into over GH¢9,000. We totally disagree with them. We pay our labour, we buy inputs for the farm, and then we also pay ourselves.”
“So in a nutshell, we get only GH¢600 for that while COCOBOD also gets GH¢7,000. So what work did COCOBOD do and give us that money? It’s an insult!” he asserted.
Ranking Member on Parliament’s Food and Agriculture Committee, Eric Opoku, has indicated that the Minority Group in Parliament, in conjunction with the NDC Communications Bureau, will embark on a series of engagements with cocoa farmers across the country over Ghana’s 2023/24 cocoa forward sales.
Eric Opoku made this known after calling on the Chief Executive Officer of COCOBOD, Joseph Boahen Aidoo, to render an unqualified apology to former President John Mahama for criticizing him over his comments on Ghana’s 2023/24 cocoa forward sales.
Shortly after the announcement of the farm-gate price of cocoa for the 2023/24 cocoa season, former President Mahama criticized government for shortchanging cocoa farmers by pegging the farm-gate price at a paltry GHS1,308 despite a 46-year record-high surge in the world market price.
In an Open Letter to former President Mahama dated 12th September, 2023, Mr Joseph Boahen Aidoo, questioned President Mahama’s understanding of how the producer price of cocoa is determined and claimed that the former President erroneously used $3,600 as the world market price to calculate the producer price.
Chief Executive Officer of COCOBOD, Joseph Boahen Aidoo
In that statement, the COCOBOD CEO claimed that consistent with practice, Ghana’s cocoa beans are “mostly sold forward”, and that “the 2023/24 crop was sold between October 2022 and March 2023 at international prices; ranging between $2,200 per ton and $2,400 per ton.”
The statement added that “the international price of cocoa then began to increase in April 2023, when a greater percentage of the 2023/24 crop had already been sold.”
But according to the MP for Asunafo South, Eric Opoku, the Minority in Parliament has come by indisputable evidence that exposes a blatant lie peddled by the Chief Executive Officer of COCOBOD
“It has now emerged that the CEO of COCOBOD told deliberate falsehood in his desperate attempt to justify the rip-off that the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia government has meted out to our hard working cocoa farmers,” he wrote in a statement.
According to Mr Opoku, in documents submitted to Parliament by COCOBOD as part of processes for the approval of the syndicated loan for cocoa purchases for the 2023/24 crop season, it was disclosed that only 36.2% of our cocoa for this season was sold forward and used as collateral to secure the $800 million syndicated loan.
“Specifically, Paragraph 7.2 of the Joint Memorandum to Parliament by the Minister for Food and Agriculture and the Minister of Finance on the approval of the terms of the $800 million syndicated facility partly reads; “The facility does not add to Ghana’s debt stock. The loan is backed by cocoa sales contracts, and the quantity of cocoa collateralized for its repayment is about 36.20% of the anticipated production”.
“For the avoidance of doubt, 36.2% of the projected cocoa output for the 2023/24 season translates to a paltry 307,700 tons. This volume of cocoa cannot by any stretch of imagination constitute a “greater percentage” of our projected annual production volume (i.e 850,000 tons) as claimed by the CEO of COCOBOD in his deceitful response to President Mahama,” he added.
Mr Opoku further highlighted that COCOBOD also disclosed to Parliament that the remainder of 63.8% of our 2023/24 cocoa output, which translates to 542,300 tons would be sold on the market at spot prices, which has been ranging between $3,600 and $4,000.
He asserts that if COCOBOD succeeds in selling the remainder at the minimum spot price of $3,600 per ton as a worst case scenario, COCOBOD would have shortchanged our hard working cocoa farmers to tune of $542,300,000 (GHC6.5billion).
“As a matter of fact, further information submitted to Parliament indicates that, COCOBOD has already sold part of the remaining 63.8% of our cocoa output for the 2023/24 season at spot prices ranging between $3,500 and $3,770 per ton from October to mid-November 2023,” he continued.
Per the information privy to him, Mr Opoku concluded that former President Mahama was spot on when he accused the government of shortchanging cocoa farmers whose “toil and sacrifices continue to sustain the country’s economy.”
“The incompetent and dishonest CEO of COCOBOD in his bid to deceive our hard-working farmers, threw truth and integrity to the dogs and sought to attack the credibility of President Mahama for exposing this grand heist.”
He iterated that Mr Joseph Boahen Aidoo has lied to cocoa farmers and the entire nation.
“He had no basis whatsoever to impugn ill motive into what was a statement of fact by the respected former President. He therefore owes President Mahama, hardworking cocoa farmers and the entire nation an unqualified apology,” Mr Opoku added.
More than 1,000 cocoa farmers in Hwidiem, Ahafo Region, are upset with a company called Touton-Eliho Ghana Limited because they haven’t been paid their bonuses. So, they want the government to get involved in the situation.
Sampson Awal Mohammed, who leads the group, said at a press conference in Hwidiem that the company has not paid them bonuses totaling GH₵470,000. 00 or GH₵47 billion, as they had agreed. The group says not getting paid is causing problems for their lives and cocoa farms.
“COBOBOD and other trusted groups said we should sell our cocoa to this company because it’s trustworthy and follows the rules.
Nana Yaw Marfo, a cocoa farmer, said that if they don’t get their extra money soon, they will take the company to court.
Adom News Reporter, Sammy Asare, talked to the company managers who agreed they owed the farmers money but said they will explain their side of the story later.
More than 1,000 cocoa farmers in Hwidiem, Ahafo Region, have raised concerns about the non-payment of their bonuses or premiums by Touton-Eliho Ghana Limited.
The farmers, owed a total of GHC470,000.00, have urged the government to intervene. According to Sampson Awal Mohammed, the non-payment is adversely affecting their lives and cocoa farms.
The farmers had been convinced by COCOBOD and other credible organizations to sell their cocoa to Touton-Eliho Ghana Limited, which they believed to be reliable and law-abiding.
The company, however, has not paid the bonuses as agreed, prompting the farmers to seek redress through the legal system if not settled within one week.
The company’s managers acknowledged the debt but stated that they would provide their version of the story in due time.
The Progressive People’s Party (PPP) has called upon the government to prioritize the enhancement of the entire cocoa farming value chain within the country.
While acknowledging the recent commendable increase in cocoa purchasing prices, the PPP emphasized the necessity for the government to explore avenues for improving the overall cocoa value chain.
This stance was articulated in a statement issued by the PPP, with National Chairman Nana Ofori Owusu’s signature and release in Accra on Wednesday.
The party believes that Ghana can substantially improve cocoa farmers’ livelihoods by providing them with resources, training, infrastructure, financial access, and by empowering them through cooperative associations.
This approach aims to reduce reliance on international price fluctuations.
“Additionally, promoting diversification, value addition, and sustainable farming practices will contribute to the long-term growth and sustainability of the cocoa industry in Ghana,” the PPP added.
Furthermore, the PPP emphasized the importance of promoting diversification, adding value to cocoa products, and adopting sustainable farming practices to ensure the long-term growth and sustainability of Ghana’s cocoa industry.
In terms of strategies to uplift farmers’ livelihoods, the PPP proposed that the government should focus on providing resources and training, developing infrastructure, encouraging diversification and value addition, facilitating access to finance and credit, empowering farmers through cooperative associations, and promoting sustainable farming practices.
On September 9, President Akufo-Addo announced a significant 63.6% increase in the farm gate price of cocoa beans, raising it from GH₵800 to GH₵1,308 per bag for the upcoming cocoa season.
The president made this historic announcement during the opening of the 2023/2024 cocoa season in Tepa, Ashanti Region, and noted that this increase is the highest in West Africa over the past 15 years.
President Akufo-Addo also highlighted the challenges posed by low international cocoa prices, compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite these difficulties, he expressed the government’s commitment to supporting cocoa farmers by increasing cocoa prices from GH₵12,800 per ton in 2016 to GH₵20,943 per ton and GH₵1,308 per bag in 2023.
This significant raise aims to encourage producer investment and sustain the cocoa industry’s future growth.
“Until recently, international prices of cocoa have remained relatively low and made worse by COVID-19. In spite of this, the government has made a very hard decision to increase producer prices of cocoa. Cocoa prices have increased from GH¢7,600 per ton in 2016 to GH¢12,800 per ton in 2022. A significant increase of 68 percent. This has had an adverse impact on COCOBOD’s financial performance.”
“However, the sustainability of the entire industry hinges on the producer being willing to invest in the business and be certain that the government repays the appropriate price. The international market is beginning to pick up and the government in keeping with our promise to Ghana cocoa farmers has today increased cocoa beans from GH¢12,800 to GH¢20,943 per ton and GH¢1,308 per bag,” he stated.
Minister for food and agriculture, Bryan Acheampong has recently revealed that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo is poised to announce series of measures aimed at benefiting cocoa farmers. This eagerly anticipated announcement is expected to deter farmers from resorting to illegal mining activities by presenting them with compelling alternatives.
While the Minister refrained from providing specific details in advance of the President’s announcement, he expressed his confidence that the forthcoming measures will offer significant incentives to cocoa farmers.
“I don’t want to take the wind out of the president’s sail. There’s a big announcement coming for Cocoa farmers in this country. It is unprecedented. There’s going to be a big, big, big announcement for cocoa farmers,” he was quoted by myjoyonlline.com.
“Cocoa farming is going to change in this country because we know it is an important crop, and we know the toils of farmers,” he added.
The Minister further added that the benefits of leasing cocoa lands to illegal miners may be juicy in the interim but cannot match the benefits that cocoa farming will bring in the long run.
“I don’t think the money the ‘galamsey'[illegal miner] person will give you if you aggregate it over ten years, it will beat what cocoa will give you,” he argued.
“Yes, if you compare what you will get from Cocoa to that of what the galamsey person will give you, maybe the galamsayers money will be so much for this year, but what happens next year, next five years, and next ten years? You may be coerced to give out your property but in the long term, you will lose,” he explained.
The Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD ) has indicated that, the inability of the institution to pay cocoa farmers their desired price for their farm produce is not enough justification for some farmers to enable and facilitate the smuggling of cocoa beans to neighboring countries.
In a one-on-one interview with Daniel Oduro on the Lowdown show on GhanaWeb TV, Fiifi Boafo, Head of Public Affairs, acknowledged that the inability of COCOBOD to meet the price demand of cocoa farmers for their beans is a significant factor for which some farmers smuggle cocoa beans to neighboring countries, however, the reason is not defensible since farmers and the state lose a lot of revenue when cocoa is smuggled.
The Public Relations Officer questioned farmers on where they expected government to generate revenue from to meet their projected price if they encourage cocoa smuggling.
“If we spend resources to buy facilities and finance all the other initiatives to increase productivity and they are smuggled out of the country, where do you expect us to get money to pay for all these services and match up the price?” Fiifi Boafo asked.
Fiifi Boafo added that relatively, Ghanaian cocoa farmers although are paid less for their produce are more privileged than farmers in Cote D’Ivoire. He explained that, farmers in Cote D’Ivoire are not provided fertilizers and other incentives by the government but in addition to the competitive price paid for cocoa, Ghanaian farmers are provided with fertilizers.
He explained, “We buy fertilizers, insecticides and provide other incentives for farmers to enable them carry on with their activities, but farmers in Cote D’ Ivoire do not enjoy such privileges, they are paid and they must cater for such needs by themselves.”
Cocoa farmers have been urged to take pruning of their farms seriously to help maximise crop yield and increase beans production on their farms.
Mr Ebenezer Agyin, Ashanti Regional Manager, Cocoa Health and Extension Division (CHED) of the COCOBOD, who made the call, said pruning was an effective farm hygiene exercise, which prevented diseases and pests and could reduce crop loses to about 40 percent.
He said Ghana’s cocoa production rate which shot up to 1,000,000 metric tonnes in 2021, was as a result of effective pruning exercise carried out by the COCOBOD across the country.
Addressing the Susu Biribi Women in Cocoa Association at Kwamang in the Afigya Kwabre North District in the Ashanti Region, he said the COCOBOD was poised to assist farmers with the requisite technical expertise to increase crop yields in the 2023 season.
Mr Agyin and a team of CHED officers had gone to the community to present quantities of chocolate products to the farmers as part of activities to climax the National Chocolate week celebrations in Ghana.
The products were made available by the World Cocoa Foundation, an international membership organization that promotes sustainability in the cocoa sector, and the COCOBOD.
The COCOBOD, according to Mr. Agyin, was supporting farmers with fuels to operate the motorised sprayers to enhance effective spraying exercises against insects and other cocoa diseases.
On farm rehabilitation exercise under the cocoa swollen shoot virus disease, he said the COCOBOD would engage affected farmers directly instead of relying on the rehabilitation assistants.
He explained that absenteeism on the part of some of the rehabilitation assistants, had left most of the farms to remain in bushes.
It was, therefore, imperative that COCOBOD engaged the farmers directly, entrust all farm maintenance activities and channel payments due them for the exercise.
Madam Christiana Amponsah, Ashanti Regional Coordinator for Gender, CHED, said women played major role, in cocoa production and that was why the COCOBOD saw the need to honour such women on the occasion of the National Chocolate Week.
She said about 30 per cent of cocoa produced in the country were from women.
However, this enormous contribution of women in cocoa production was often not recognized.
Madam Amponsah said it was important to carry women along the cocoa value chain to ensure sustainable increase in production.
Madam Mary Blankson, Financial Secretary to the Susu Biribi Women in Cocoa Association, commended the COCOBOD for presenting the products to the Association.
She called on the government to continually support farmers with farming incentives to boost production.
They say returns are low and that they are struggling to break free from poverty.
“Cocoa’s future is very poor. It’s very poor. It’s very poor. We don’t like it. We want the government to just increase everything for us because we spend time, our energy mostly on the side of the cocoa business, but after all, we get nothing”, said Bensil Aryetey, a farmer.
Millions of small farmers in Ivory Coast and Ghana, which together grow 60 percent of the world’s cocoa, live in grinding poverty.
Treasurer for Ghana National Cocoa Farmers Association, Nana Yaa Asantewaa, has warned cocoa will soon be scarce in the country
She also lamented that cocoa farmers are not given fair prices got their cocoa products, and the same applies to other farmers.
Speaking on NyankontonMu Nsem on Rainbow Radio 87.5Fm, she asserted that the major reason why several young people do not want to farm is due to these issues.
He posited that farmers are not usually not respected or treated fairly.
“Farmers are not treated with respect. We are not recognised. People determine the kind of prices they want to give us. Cocoa pricing is worse. The government of Ghana do not give us fair pricing.”
These and other challenges, she added, have prevented several young people from going into farming.
She said when the youth see how farmers struggle, and unfairly they are treated, they [youth] are discouraged from pursuing a career in farming.
She warned that “soon, cocoa will no longer be a major commodity. There would also be a scarcity of food in the country. If we fail to address these challenges, farming will no longer be lucrative, and Ghana will face a serious food crisis”.
Director of Special Services at the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD), Mr Charles Amenyaglo, has cautioned cocoa farmers to desist from smuggling and selling of subsidised cocoa fertilizers. He said any farmer or buyer of such subsidised cocoa fertilizers would be arrested and prosecuted.
Mr Amenyagio, who gave the waming in an interview with the media in Takoradi after four suspected cocoa fertilizer smugglers, were put before the Takoradi Port circuit court B, for allegedly smuggling 328 bags of subsidised cocoa fertilizers.
He said Cocoa fertilizer smuggling was becoming a torn in the flesh of COCOBOD, stressing that more than 2,000 bags of cocoa fertilizers were retrieved from smugglers across the country last year alone.
Mr Amenyaglo pointed out that if the practice was not nipped in the bud COCOBOD would not be able to achieve its aim of increased cocoa yield since nutrients on many cocoa farms were depleted.
He said it was an offence punishable by law to be engaged in such a practice, noting that the fertilizers were highly subsidised.
He said they procured the fertilizers at 560 cedis a bag and sold to the farmers at 80 cedis a bag, which they transport to the farming communities and hand over to the farmer cooperatives for distribution to their members.
Mr Amenyaglo expressed worry that some unscrupulous people had been unlawfully purchasing cocoa fertilizers delivered to cocoa farmers at a highly subsidised rates, adding “some of them have made it their business to be going around buying cocoa fertilizers, which have been delivered to the farmers at their doorsteps.
The four suspects, Amadu Combat 55, Kingsley Baah Wiredu, 32 driver, Issaka Mbawuni, 38 and Dawuda Yakubu 44 were arrested at Samenaboi in the Western Region around 0200hours on Sunday September 11, with trucks load of COCOBOD subsidised fertilizers.
The court presided over by Her Honour, Mrs Abigail K. Asare, did not take their plea and discharged the suspects with the explanation that the charge of causing financial loss to the State leveled against the four did not tally with the facts.
She, therefore, asked the prosecution to collaborate with COCOBOD officials to conduct thorough investigations into the case and come up with the appropriate charges against the four suspects.
He continued by saying that the government must meet them halfway by raising the cost of a bag of cocoa to GHC 1,000 in order to save their position.
“We can only appeal so we are appealing to the government to increase the price to GHC1,000 so that we can cater for our families because we have dependents and times are really hard for usâ€.
Buttressing the point for the increment, the Chief Farmer for the Berekum Municipality, Nana Kwasi Diawuo, stressed that the current trend has the potential of discouraging young people from engaging in farming and wants the government to make farming lucrative to attract more people.
“The way things are, nobody will join farming especially the youth so I am urging the government to make farming lucrativeâ€.
According to reports, the fertilizers were transported from Goaso in the Ahafo Region to the Ashanti Region.
Citi News understands the consignment was seized by officers at the Kenyase District Police Command in the Kwabre East Municipality of the Ashanti Region.
According to sources, police upon a tip-off on Friday, August 26, 2022 followed up and confiscated the items and kept them at a shop at Achiase-Jamasi near Kenyase.
Information available to Citi News also indicates that one person whose name was given as Shaibu Amadu a 42-year-old was arrested by the police to assist in investigations.
Sources claim that the suspect was later given a police inquiry bail and instructed to report to the police so they can continue their inquiries with him.
The fertilizers are currently in the custody of the Kenyase District Police Command as investigations continue into the matter.
The Member of Parliament for Offinso South Dr. Isaac Yaw Opoku has touted the achievements of President Akufo-Addo in the cocoa sector.
Appearing on Frontline on Rainbow Radio 87.5Fm, he posited that extension officers for the sector were only 600 for the entire country, but the number has been tripled under the current administration.
He also explained that the government is resolved to replanting all swollen-shoot affected farms in all the regions of cocoa cultivation, and thereby, help improve the yield per hectare for all cocoa farmers.
He told host Kwabena Agyapong that farmers and landowners would be paid compensation where tenancy agreements exist.
According to him, when the NPP took over, there were several hectares of farms that were unproductive but the measures adopted by the NPP has improved the sector.
The swollen shoot disease he noted affected farms especially in the Western North Region, but the government has achieved a lot.
In 2020 President Akufo-Addo announced that over 11,564.28 hectares of swollen shoot-affected farms in the Western North and Eastern Regions have been treated and planted with cocoa, plantain, and economic shade trees.
He also revealed 8,904 farmers, out of which 7,358 have been fully compensated.
Minority Spokesperson on Roads, Kwame Agbodza has accused the New Patriotic Party government of inflating the cost of cocoa roads.
According to the Minority in Parliament, the government bloated the cost of roads after the Agriculture Minister stated that 12,000 kilometres of cocoa roads costing GH₵13.6 billion have been completed since 2019.
But answering questions on the floor of Parliament, the Agric Minister, Owusu Afriyie Akoto, noted that the mode of awarding contracts was fair and transparent.
“Mr Speaker, under the current administration, 286 cocoa roads contract with a total length of 4465.89 kilometres have been completed for construction since 2019 at the cost of GH₵13.6 billion. The entire review process and project preparations were done upon several engagements and considerations with the legacy group.â€
However, according to Kwame Agbodza, the cost of cocoa roads does not give value to money. He also claimed that the NPP government awarded contracts based on sole sourcing.
He said, “Under the NDC, 2,900 kilometres of those roads cost GH₵ 5.1 billion. The question we should be asking is why project costs in this country went up so astronomically under the NPP. Out of 286 projects, [a] whopping 1077 were awarded on sole sourcing. This is a government you can never trust. They tell you to look up, you should be looking down.â€
Mr Yaw Biredu Boateng, the Chief Cocoa Farmer for New Nsutam in the Eastern Region, has called for the protection of cocoa farms as done for rubber plantations to preserve the trees from destruction.
He said timber merchants invaded cocoa farms in the area, fell the timber and carted them through the farms resulting in uprooting and destroying some of the cocoa trees.
He said galamsey operators also used excavators to dig trenches, thereby destroying the trees.
Mr Boateng said cocoa production was dwindling and if care was not taken, inputs to help increase yield would be a waste through activities of timber companies and galamsey operators
“Cocoa is the backbone of the Ghanaian economy and therefore the need for ensuring adequate security through laws and regulations for cocoa farms, to help sustain the economy,†he said.
Mr Boateng said the rubber plantations in the Western Region, to the contrary, were given adequate security, which protected growers from the wanton destruction of their rubber trees.
Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia says the government would establish a pension scheme for cocoa farmers.
He said, just like teachers and other workers who enjoyed retirement benefit, the government wanted the farmers to enjoy a good life after they could no longer work on their farms.
Dr Bawumia said this when he addressed a durbar of Chiefs and people of Santrokofi, Lolobi, Likpe and Akpafu Traditional Areas as part of his tour of the Oti Region.
He said the creation of a District for the traditional areas was a monumental moment in the history of the four areas, adding that creation of a Constituency would follow soon.
The Vice President said the creation of a District for the areas was because they were left behind in terms of development such as education, health, roads network and infrastructure.
“We are building a new Ghana and one of the most advanced countries in the world.”
He said the government’s transformation agenda was an inclusive one, where every citizen would have a feel of the development outcomes.
Dr Bawumia said the restoration of teachers and nursing trainee allowances, as well as the implementation of an ambulance system, were meant to make sure every constituency benefited.
“Over 76 factories have been supported and built and by 2022, every District shall have a factory,” he said.
Nana Kwasi Owusu Yeboa, the Oti Regional Minister, noted that the creation of the Region and the Guan District would expand development throughout the areas as well as transform lives of the citizens.
Nana Soglo Alloh IV, Paramount Chief of Likpe Traditional Area, commended the government for the development projects in the traditional areas.
He said that despite the projects, the four traditional areas had infrastructure development deficit.
The Paramount Chief appealed for the refurbishment and upgrade of Likpe Bakua health centre to a district hospital.
He said the Senior High Schools in the four traditional areas had not seen any major developments and asked for their renovation and supply for more educational materials.
Nana Alloh called for construction works on the area’s roads and expansion of water systems to benefit more residents.
Vice President Mahamadu Bawumia on Friday launched the Cocoa Management System (CMS) to create a comprehensive digital database for cocoa farmers for effective and efficient management of the cocoa industry.
The CMS is an online portal that will capture the demographics of cocoa farmers, farm sizes, input supplies, payment transactions and facilitate the roll out of the Cocoa Farmers’ Pension Scheme.
Vice President Bawumia, speaking at the launch in Accra, said the System would be a game-changer for the cocoa industry, enhance transparency and help bring total transformation in the sector.
He entreated the Management of COCOBOD to build in-house capacity to manage the System to ensure its sustainability.
He called for collaboration between all stakeholders in the cocoa industry for effective implementation of the programme.
Dr Bawumia urged the media to undertake sensitisation drive to educate cocoa farmers and all players in the cocoa value chain for successful implementation.
He lauded the Management of COCOBOD for implementing various innovative initiatives over the past three and half years, saying that, the CMS was in tandem with the Government’s digitisation agenda to formalise the economy.
He said digitisation was revolutionalising the global economy, therefore it was imperative to leverage on information technology to enhance productivity and promote accountability and transparency.
The Vice President outlined various interventions rolled out by the Akufo-Addo-led government to improve the income and livelihoods of cocoa farmers in the country.
They include; hand pollination, pruning, and irrigation of cocoa farmers, supply of subsidised fertilizers and farm inputs, as well as the introduction of living income differential and increase in cocoa prices recently.
Dr Bawumia also mentioned digital infrastructure initiatives rolled out to generally formalise the Ghanaian economy including the digital property addressing system, national identification system and mobile money interoperability payment system.
Mr Joseph Boahen Aidoo, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of COCOBOD,said the Management of COCOBOD over the past three and half years were implementing initiatives to address the myriad of challenges be-devilling the cocoa industry.
He mentioned some of the initiatives as early spraying, hand pollination, supply of slashes, pruning and irrigation of some cocoa farms to ensure all-year round water.
He was of the conviction that, the CMS if fully implemented, would create a central database for cocoa farmers, create inter and intra connectivity generation of cocoa industry players and transform the industry for the better.
Mr George Oduro, a Deputy Minister of Food and Agriculture, said the government had adopted mechanisation programmes to accelerate economic growth and make cocoa farming attractive to the Ghanaian youth.
He said government had supplied 100,000 motorized slashes to cocoa farmers, embarked on irrigation in some cocoa farmers and continued the fertilizer subsidisation programme to improve cocoa production.
The Deputy Minister was of the belief that the CMS would help eliminate fraud, theft and myriad of challenges facing the cocoa industry.
Alhaji Alhassan Bukari, President of Cocoa, Coffee and Cashew Farmers Association, on behalf of the association, thanked the Government for introducing major innovative initiatives to better the lots of cocoa farmers, which had also reduced the drudgery of farming and made it attractive for the Ghanaian youth.
Cocoa farmers in the country have been urged to embrace the mass cocoa spraying exercise introduced by government.
In an exclusive interview shortly after a farmers’ meeting at Nsawam in the Eastern Region, Nana Kumi Abiesi, Nsawam Adoagyiri Municipal Chief Farmer, told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) that embracing the mass cocoa spraying exercise, would help farmers to increase the crop yield.
He explained that the exercise was part of a high-tech cocoa production method and said the introduction of the high-tech programme was a testimony of government’s determination to help improve the cocoa industry.
According to him, when farmers embrace the programme, would help increase the national cocoa output from the present tonnage, in order to reduce poverty among the farmers.
He said COCOBOD was increasing the spraying machines in the various cocoa growing areas to enable the spraying gangs reach every farm, with a view to combating the capsid virus.
Cocoa farmers in some communities in the Fanteakwa South District have received training in alternative livelihood empowerment programmes to generate additional incomes.
The training programme was organized by the General Agricultural Workers’ Union (GAWU) of Trades Union Congress (TUC) as part of efforts to build the capacities of cocoa farmers in income generating ventures to enable them generate other incomes outside cocoa production to sustain themselves and their families.
The Union is also encouraging Cocoa growing communities to form Community Anti Child Labour Mentoring Committees to ensure that children are prevented from engaging in all forms of hazardous activities, especially in cocoa farms.
Mr Andrews Addoquaye Tagoe, Deputy General Secretary of GAWU speaking at the inauguration of an Anti- Child Labour Committee at Nsuapemso in the Fanteakwa South District, said the livelihood empowerment training programmes were aimed at promoting decent work and improving the incomes of cocoa farmers.
Additionally, the Community Anti-Child Labour Mentoring Committee would ensure that cocoa growing communities were free from child labour and that cocoa was not produced from the sweat of children.
He mentioned some of the communities benefiting from the project as Tontro in the Abuakwa North District, Lolobi-Ashanbi, and Kpando-Torkor in the Volta region.
The cocoa farmers were trained in mushroom farming, snail rearing and the use of cocoa husks and pods to produce ‘Alata Semina’.
Mr. Tagoe advised the farmers to form Farmer Cooperatives and Local Unions in order to have access to and benefit from the services of the Union as well as inputs supplies, education and advocacy campaigns being organized by the COCOBOD and other agencies.
Ms Adelaide Achiaa Afrifa, Agricultural Extension Officer at Tontro, urged all farmers to join the local cooperatives and groups to benefit from training and educational programmes, while protecting their children from harmful work which could affect their health and education.
Nana Baafour Kwabena Alerti 11, Chief of Nsuapemso declared his community a Child Labour Free Zone and warned that any farmer found engaging his children in hazardous farming activities would be prosecuted.
Mr. Jackson Tei Kwame, a farmer, called for the inclusion of persons with disabilities in child protection policies and programmes.
Ms. Gifty Ampofo, a 14-year-old JHS student of Afi Memorial School, who was rescued from Child labour, said she was now happy that she could attend school peacefully to become a responsible person in future.
Officials of the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) have, since the outbreak of the coronavirus in Ghana, been partaking in international conferences with partners through technology, hence syndication will not be affected by the outbreak of the pandemic, Joseph Boahen Aidoo, Chief Executive Officer has said.
There were fears the syndication may not happen following the coronavirus outbreak which is devastating the global economy.
But Mr Boahen Aidoo assured stakeholders that players in the cocoa sector are working through the use of modern technology in spite of the pandemic hence no need to panic.
He also disclosed that the timing of the cocoa syndication has changed but not cancelled entirely.
Mr Boahen Aidoo told TV3 in an interview on Thursday April 9 that : “There have been some meetings outside Ghana that because of the COVID-19 pandemic we cannot travel to take part but we are doing conference calls to take part.â€
He added : “We are also rescheduling the programme of syndication. The timing may delay but again but it will not mean that we cannot have syndication at all. Definitely syndication will take place.â€
He also said the COVID-19 will not have serious impact on production in the 2021 crop season because COCOBOD is in full operation despite the outbreak.
“We are working around the clock to ensure that the services that will go to our cocoa farmers are delivered and we are doing so with all our allied agencies.
“Nothing is halting our operations and let me also assure our farmers that purchasing of cocoa is also not stopped.â€
COCOBOD is targeting one million metric tons for the 2021 season.
Cocoa farmers have been encouraged to patronise the services of the Produce Buying Company (PBC) to benefit from the new pension scheme instituted by the Government.
Madam Andrea Franz, the PBC Central Regional Human Resource Manager, said the only means to sustain the Company was for the farmers to continually patronise its services.
She made the call in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) at Swedru in the Central Region in her New Year message to cocoa farmers.
Madam Franz said the PBC, with almost 80 per cent shares by government, had put in place comprehensive mechanisms that would cater well for the welfare of cocoa farmers.
She stated that the farmers could enjoy the Pension Scheme instituted by the Government if they continued to sell their cocoa beans to the PBC, which had a track record of trustworthiness in the industry.
Madam Franz indicated that the Company was directly under the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) and had quality administrative plans, which would go a long way to ensure better living conditions for farmers.
She warned that if cocoa farmers allowed foreign companies to bait them to sell their produce to them it would affect growth of the state owned company.
She said it was regrettable that some cocoa farmers allowed some Licensed Buying Companies (LBCs) to sell fresh cocoa beans to them at lesser costs, a practice, she indicated, that could affect the quality of Ghana Cocoa on the world market.
“Ghana’s cocoa is classified as one of the best among all cocoa producing countries in the world and it is vital to maintain the quality to meet international standards,” she said.
Madam Franz appealed to the farmers to exercise restraint as they would receive every package planed for them in the 2020 cocoa season.
She gave the assurance that the PBC would continue to pursue policies and programmes to their benefit to ensure the country met the one million tonnes target it had set for 2020.
