Farmers in the Nandom Municipality of the Upper West Region say they might not be able to improve their financial situation if government as well as other well-meaning organisations and individuals do not go to their aid. Speaking to A1radio at Nandom, the Director of Operations for Tieme Ndo Mr. Moses Yangnemenga, who spoke on behalf of the farmers, said all their toil is for naught if the major concerns of Post-Harvest Losses (PHL) are not addressed.
Mr. Yangnemenga said farmers in the Nandom Municipality, unlike their colleagues in other parts of the region, are unable to leave their crops; particularly maize, on the farms to dry. The crops, he explained, will be fed on by the many cattle that are herded into the Municipality to graze. The farmers thus have to harvest the crops early and try to dry them to have optimal moisture content on drying platforms.
The Director of Operations at Tieme Ndo said inadequate drying platforms pose a challenge adding that over the years, there has been no technological advancement in the area of crop drying in the Nandom Municipality.
“Post-Harvest Loss is a serious threat to food security. The numbers may mean nothing to you until you experience it. What you are seeing is corn and bean germinating while being dried. Drying of farm produce has become one of the challenges for rural farmers since they have limited space to dry up to 5 different crops, which are being harvested within the same month. Some crops are abandoned to rot on the farm as a result. We need affordable innovations that would solve this problem,” he lamented.
Mr. Yangnemenga proposed the use of solar-powered drying machinery that would shorten the time needed for food products to be dried to the optimal moisture level. He however called for assistance as the farmers will be unable to purchase this for themselves.
Tieme Ndo, which translates to ‘Push me Up’ in Dagaare, is a social enterprise that focuses on providing farm inputs on both cash and credit to smallholder farmer cooperatives in a bid to help them improve their livelihoods.
The organisation’s tagline ‘Zero Hunger, No Poverty’ forms part of global efforts to ensure food security and the eradication of poverty as captured by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) one and two.
A1Radioonline.com|101.1MHz| Mark Kwasi Ahumah Smith|Ghana
