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Cashew sector to fetch Ghana US$ 2.5 billion – Deputy Minister

By
Dennis Peprah GNA

Yeji (B/R), July 20, GNA – The cashew
industry is expected to fetch the nation US$ 2.5 billion in the next five
years, Mr Augustine Collins Ntim, a Deputy Minister of Local Government and
Rural Development, has said.

He said the government has devoted GHȼ
1 billion towards the establishment of the Tree Crop Development Authority that
would regulate the cashew industry and revamp that sector to contribute
significantly to the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Mr Ntim, who is responsible for Rural
Economic Development and Agriculture, directed the Metropolitan, Municipal and
District Assemblies (MMDAs) to raise the targeted 100,000 cashew seedlings
under the Planting for Export and Rural Development (PERD) programme to meet
the target.

The cashew seedlings would be supplied to
registered farmers under the PERD programme free of charge for plantation.

He said the PERD has come to stay and that
government is contemplating on engaging unemployed youth to plant the cashew
seedlings for farmers.

Interacting with the Heads of Department
(HODs) and staff of the Pru East District Assembly at Yeji in the Bono East
Region, the Deputy Minister said the successful implementation of the Planting
for Food and Jobs (PfFJs) and the PERD programmes depended mostly on the MMDAs.

He said the PERD, PfFJs and other social
intervention programmes rolled out by government were all geared towards job
creation and poverty reduction, and directed the assemblies to intensify
educational campaigns for more farmers and Ghanaians in general to register and
benefit.

Mr Ntim said documentation and reliable data
collection are essential as they were key index in measuring the impact and
success of the PfFJs programmes and called on the Assemblies to be awakened to
improve data collection.

He called for effective collaboration
between Departments and Agencies within the MMDAs towards the implementation of
the PfFJs and PERD to enable the government to achieve desirable results.

Mr Ntim said the PfFJs and the PERD has huge
potential for job creation and reduce rural poverty to spur rapid
socio-economic growth and development and advised Ghanaians to embrace and
support those programmes.

He said the government is ready to provide
agriculture inputs and equipment to expand the scope of the programmes; and the
MMDAs were thus required to register more farmers and make the programmes
attractive for the unemployed youth to join.

Mr Joshua Kwaku Abonkrah, the Pru East
District Chief Executive, said access to farm lands is very difficult in the
area due to chieftaincy disputes and land litigation and this is impeding the
implementation of the PERD and the PfFJs in the District.

He said many farmers in the area had registered
under the PERD and desired to go into commercial plantation of cashew but
access to farm lands is a major challenge.

Mr Abonkrah advised traditional authorities
to bury their differences and release lands to enable interested farmers to
engage in the programmes.

GNA

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