General News of Saturday, 29 July 2017
Source: Classfmonline.com
2017-07-29
Agriculture Minister, Dr Afriyie Akoto
Economist, Joe Jackson, has said it was out of place for the Minister of Food and Agriculture Dr Owusu Afriyie Akoto to have declared victory over the fall army worm invasion.
The Minister said the invasion of the worms has been “totally defeated.”
“Mr. Speaker, I want to assure the nation that the Fall armyworm invasion has been totally defeated,” he told parliament on Thursday, 27 July.
According to him, the “situation which has been created by some people that the armyworm is consuming the Planting for Food and Jobs [program], Mr. Speaker, is not correct, it is wrong.”
But commenting on this on TV3’s New Day programme on Saturday 29 July 2017, Mr Jackson said: “The chemicals being sprayed do not work on the eggs and that is why the farmers say the chemicals are not working. Today, you spray and the worms that have been hatched go off, but, the eggs release new worms.
“I don’t know what the minister is talking about. We are extremely skeptical about what the minister said. I can’t believe that he is declaring victory so quickly, so easy when there is nothing on the ground to show.”
