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Tag: Dr Charles Nyaaba

  • Ghanaian farmers are patriotic; no businessman would like to be a farmer – Dr Charles Nyaaba

    Ghanaian farmers are patriotic; no businessman would like to be a farmer – Dr Charles Nyaaba

    Executive Director at Peasant Farmers Association, Dr. Charles Nyaaba, has classified Ghanaian farmers as the most patriotic individuals in the country.

    He argued that Ghanaian farmers are putting their lives on the line to prevent food shortages.

    According to him, the farming sector is not as easy and lucrative as many perceive; instead, it is an industry fraught with risks that deter businessmen from venturing into it.

    He added that it costs an arm and a leg to be a farmer, as they have to battle with climate variability, market challenges, and high input costs to produce food.

    ” If you are classifying patriotic individuals in the country that will be Ghanaian farmers. Majority of those who always claim that Ghanaian farmers are not doing their best. Few of them tried not less than 2 seasons they had to leave the sector because they claim it’s not a profitable venture.

    ” If you look at the risks that Ghanaian farmers have to take in producing to supply to all of us, no business person who has an alternative to do other economic activities will do that. We have to battle with climate rates, market challenges, high input forces etc”.

    Dr. Nyaaba also mentioned that seeking funds from financial institutions is a daunting task for farmers, as these institutions doubt they will get their money back without delays.

    He further added that the government does not give the agricultural sector the necessary attention, despite allocating large sums in the budget that are not disbursed to farmers.

    “When you go to any financial institution for a loan to go and farm, the bank will not like to see your face in the bank. Yet we are doing all this to supply foods. When you take last year and this year for instance government completely took its hands off the Agriculture sector in terms of investment that goes to the farmer. But when you look at the national budget there was a huge amount of allocation that is going to the Agricultural sector yet at the end of the day the Minister reports that this much is spent in the sector yet nothing went to the farmer.

    Dr Charles Nyaaba stated that “What you are seeing in the market is from our efforts. We have to compete with our foreign partners who are getting huge subsidy, how can we survive?.

  • Peasant Farmers Association: “PFJ market attests to policy’s failure.”

    According to Dr. Charles Nyaaba, executive director of the Peasant Farmers Association of Ghana (PFAG), the decision by the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) to establish a PFJ market to sell staple commodities to the general population is evidence that the policy has failed.

    He noted that the PFJ market located on the MoFA grounds has not been able to address the nation’s worries about food security, particularly given that the items being supplied are not crops that are covered by the PFJ.

    At a recent PFAG stakeholder forum, Dr. Nyaaba discussed the situation of agriculture in the nation and how the 2023 Budget failed to address the sector’s most pressing problems.

    The association maintained that though government has spent close to GH¢3billion on the PFJ so far, these investments have unfortunately given very little returns to farmers and the general populace.

    PFAG called for a review and adjustment to the PFJ in collaboration with agriculture CSOs, policy-makers and stakeholders.

    Government has allocated a total of GH¢660.5million for the PFJ programme in 2023, of which GH¢53million (8.07 percent) has been earmarked for capital expenditure, with the remaining 90.3 percent allocated for goods and services which is expected to finance the subsidised seeds and fertiliser and other initiatives under the programme.

    While the PFAG commends government for increased investment in the PFJ, Dr. Nyaaba called for quick release of funds for service providers, such as fertiliser importers and seed suppliers, to avoid a situation of shortage of fertiliser as experienced in 2021 and 2022.

    PFAG noted that the trend in delay of funds and inputs in 2023 will have serious consequences on the sector’s development, and would further worsen the country’s food insecurity situation.

    The association said its monitoring of input distribution under the PFJ has revealed deep seated problems which should be addressed in 2023.

    “Our experience and monitoring of the PFJ over the past few years, have revealed deep issues including poor quality fertiliser and seeds being supplied under the programme. Also, credible companies which provide quality inputs have declined from participating in the PFJ, leading to farmers being short-changed with poor quality inputs,” Dr. Nyaaba said.

    This, according to PFAG, has led to a woeful loss of value for money for the Ghanaian taxpayer as many farmers prefer to buy quality inputs at open market than buying from PFJ input suppliers.

    “We called for proper evaluation of the procurement process as well as measures to ensure that quality seeds and fertiliser are supplied to farmers,” the association noted.

  • Agric spending only 1.9% of government budget; far below 10% Malabo pledge – PFAG

    The Peasant Farmers Association of Ghana (PFAG) has expressed concern that the allocation is still significantly below the anticipated 10% commitment made under the Malabo declaration, despite the fact that agricultural sector spending as a percentage of total government expenditure increased marginally in 2023 to 1.95 percent over the previous year’s figure of 1.86 percent.

    Ghana is a signatory to the Comprehensive African Agricultural Development Programme of 2003 (Malabo Declaration), in which member nations were required to increase agricultural investment to 10% of annual budgets to result in, at least, 6% annual growth in the sector. However, the nation has not succeeded in doing so since.

    The PFAG, at a stakeholder dialogue on the state of agriculture in the country and failure of the 2023 budget to address the most crucial challenges facing the sector, noted that next year’s budget lacks drastic and far-reaching interventions to salvage the growing state of food insecurity in the country.

    The Association’s Programme Officer, Bismark Nortey said: “We are calling for consideration to increase investment in the agricultural sector, provided we actually want the sector to lead in the economic transformation and developing Ghana Beyond Aid”.

    Executive Director of PFAG, Dr. Charles Nyaaba, said underinvestment in the sector is underscored by MoFA’s actual budgeting expenditure averaging just 1 percent of total government expenditure from 2018 to 2021.

    He said though there are expectations that government will prioritise agricultural investment in this era of economic crisis, the sector’s growth-woes should be a matter of concern to stakeholders.

    “Given the high rate of inflation at about 40.5 percent, the nominal value of total budget allocation has reduced – while allocation to the agricultural sector in real terms has declined by 40.5 percent. This should be a matter of concern to every actor, as it is expected that in this era of economic crisis government would have prioritised agricultural investment. It must also be noted that government’s actual expenditure has always been about 28 percent lower than budget allocation [to the sector],” Dr. Nyaaba said.

    PFAG says though it is aware of investments in other ministries – such as feeder roads under the Ministry of Roads and Highways and investment in technology and research with the Ministry Science and Technology and agriculture-related investment in the Ministry of Education usually used in the computation of agricultural investment – there will not be any significant changes that can lead to 10 percent investment in the agricultural sector when such computations are done.

    “Considering the state of agriculture and state of food insecurity, our expectation of key provisions to drive agricultural transformation, improve food production, reduce food prices and improve farmers’ livelihoods have not been met in the 2023 budget,” the Association emphasised.

  • Food prices won’t come down in December – Nyaaba

    Programmes Director of the Peasant Farmers Association of Ghana, Dr Charles Nyaaba has expressed doubt that food prices will go down in December.

    This is due to the challenges farmers are going through including high cost of doing business, he said.

    Dr Nyaaba told TV3’s Roland Walker on the Big Issue, Friday November 4 that “depending on the commodities, food prices will not come down, it is going to be extremely difficult for prices to come.”

    This comes at a time the Minister of Food and Agriculture Dr. Owusu Akoto Afriyie assured that the Ministry is introducing an initiative to sell food at cheaper prices in Accra.

    Dr. Owusu Akoto Afriyie said at a meeting with farmers in Sefwi Wiaso in the Western North Region, that “the ministry itself is going to take its own initiative.”

    He added “We are going to link up with the farm gate so that we make all the arrangements to ensure that we put up kiosks on our compounds at the ministry, specifically for food from Sefwi Wiaso and we are going to give it a lot of publicity.”

    Source: 3news.com

  • Planting for food and jobs policy largely ineffective – GAWU

    The government’s planting for food and jobs policy (PFJ), according to Edward Kareweh, general secretary of the General Agricultural Workers Union (GAWU), has been entirely ineffective.

    According to government data, the PFJ has had a positive impact on the agricultural sector. For example, farmer participation has increased from 202,000 in 2017 to 1.2 million in 2019, and yields have increased for both paddy rice and corn (from 688,000 MT in 2016 to 925,000 MT in 2019 and 71% for maize, respectively).

    However, Mr. Kareweh claimed in an interview with Emmanuel Agyabeng on Let’s Talk Business that these figures do not accurately reflect the state of the industry at the moment.

    “The figures the government gave us does not represent what is on the ground. You cannot tell us that maize production for instance, in 2020, had gone up than in 2019 when there was no covid and then few months later, there was no maize in the system. The poultry industry has suffered severely and since it has not recovered, how do you reconcile this? When there is no food, you claim the policy has been successful. Where is the success? ”, he quizzed.

    He also called out the government for blaming Covid-19 for the challenges in the sector.

    “Government said that in 2023, we are going to be sufficient in production. Today, they are blaming everything on Covid when in 2020 we had higher production volumes than the year before. That tells us that Covid never affected agriculture”, he said.

    Meanwhile, Executive Director of the Peasant Farmers Association of Ghana, Dr Charles Nyaaba has described decision of the Agric Ministry to issue fuel coupons for carting foodstuff as a Political talk.

    The Agric ministry announced in July this year that it was considering offering fuel subsidies to transport firms and owners to enable them to haul foodstuffs to the market centres and force down food prices. Two months on, the peasant farmers say they are yet to see the policy being implemented.

    When that announcement was made, it was always evident to us that the government lacked the necessary resources and that it wasn’t a wise course of action for them to take.
    Anyone in the industry can tell you if the government is helping them transport food to metropolitan centers.
    What method would they employ? It seemed to me like political talk,” Says Dr. Nyaaba

    “In my opinion, the government occasionally makes problems for itself.
    Things that we don’t insist on give the idea that they can be done, but when it comes to execution, they fall short.
    Without taking into account the availability of resources to carry out their promises, I believe the administration is being overly ambitious.
    Farmers’ faith in the government is actually declining, he continued.