Several tonnes of harvested cocoa are being left to rot on the farms in Mfantseman in the Upper Denkyira East District of the Central Region due to the destruction of the main access route leading to the farms by illegal miners.
Farmers face the dangers of drowning in open pits filled with large volumes of water while carrying loads of cocoa and therefore find it safe to only carry minimal amounts of their produce leaving the larger share to go waste on the farms.
“The farmers previously relied on manual labor to cart their produce from the farm but many of the youth have now developed high taste for galamsey and no longer available for hiring and so a greater share of our produce is left to rot on the farm” Osei Yaw, a farmer who spoke to Citi News said.
When the youth abandoned farm work and manual carting of produce in exchange of galamsey, the use of tricycles became the next option for farmers.
But since last year, that option has become unreliable due to the activities of illegal miners.
Ben Yorke, a former assemblyman for the area who is also a cocoa farmer said “the tricycles are no longer able to access the farms, so we are left with no option but to leave the cocoa on the farm. We are really incurring huge losses”.
“Very soon our cocoa trees may even wither because all major rivers and streams that we depended on to tend our farms have all been heavily polluted. Some of them can no longer even be traced,” he added.
While state security apparatuses conduct anti-galamsey operations in various parts of the country the farmers wonder why the area has never been visited to clamp down on the illegal mining activities.
“We really don’t know why any of the operational teams haven’t stormed here to deal with the galamseyers. This is far beyond security threat. Our livelihoods are at stake and so we are calling on the government to come to our aid,” Kwasi Ameyaw, another farmer who is also extremely worried, told Citi News.
Citi News’ sources in the community suggest an individual only identified as IGP is responsible for the illegal mining activities.
