Stakeholders in the agricultural sector are encouraging government to do more to attract the youth into agriculture.
They say while government’s flagship agricultural programme, the Planting for Food and Jobs is commendable, more incentives need to be offered to the youth to grab their attention.
Speaking to A1 Radio at Wa, Agricultural Development Expert, Emmanuel Wullingdool intimated that because agriculture remains a highly risky venture, young people with meagre funds are unable to invest in the sector.
Mr Wullingdool urged government to consider taking up part or whole costs involved in ploughing and mechanization services.
He also asked government to invest more in area of value addition and processing as well as deal with the issues of Post-Harvest Losses (PHL).
“Government needs to continue to prioritise the agricultural sector. There was the International Celebration of the International Youth Day which focused on Youth Vaccination. If you look at the Agriculture Census from the background that 50 percent of our population are youth.
However, the percentage of youth in agriculture is not the same as youth in the entire country.
This means that we have a very aging farming population so government needs to do more to make agriculture attractive to the youth,” he said.
Touching on the Planting for Food and Jobs Programme, Mr Wullingdool explained that, “for me, the various elements of the programme are not comprehensive enough to attract many of the youth.
Under the PFJ, government is supplying subsidized fertilizers, subsidized seeds, extension services, e-agriculture and access to market”.
“What about ploughing, what about mechanization services, what about processing and all issue related to Post-Harvest Losses,” he quizzed.
Touching on the rainfall, Mr Wullingdool said the uneven distribution of the rainfall would have severe effects on yield.
He said the situation has been compounded by the recent heavy rains that have washed away crops from several acres of farmlands.
“At the beginning of the season, we needed it [rain] so much and it was not forth coming. We had a very long dry spell which meant that many people who wanted to plough around that time were facing challenges.
Now, we are getting so much of it; more than what we need,” he said.
Mr Wullingdool says the country could grapple with food shortages due to some of these issues.
Source: A1Radioonline.com|101.1MHz| Mark Kwasi Ahumah Smith|Ghana
