Empowering rural women fundamental to Ghana’s economy
women and youth focusing on promoting household nutrition and improved food security through vegetable production, he said.
We also liaise with the private sector to provide information to farmers on the available business opportunities and take full advantage to advance their business and livelihoods in the communities as well as organise training for the farmers to enhance their knowledge of their businesses, he added.
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has been working with Ecom Agroindustrial Corp. (ECOM), a global commodity trading company, as well as their international brand name partners, including Hershey’s, to strengthen women’s land rights and economically empower women in the cocoa value chain in Ghana.
The agricultural sector in Ghana still faces key constraints that curtail it from becoming competitive to driving economic growth. These constraints include sub-optimal sector coordination; low yields; weak market linkages and high post-harvest losses and low access to finance. Others include a lack of storage facilities, a market, poor road networks, and in-service training.
Access to markets and integration in value chains also remains a challenge. This is exacerbated by the lack of finance available to the farmers or the pickers to invest in increasing their production or adding value to their products. Most of the farmers neither have savings nor access to finance in the rural areas, and this goes specifically for women.
The farmers also have several challenges that affect their productivity including a lack of skills, the use of improved seeds, access to tractor services or other machinery, access to land and productive resources especially for women, low soil quality, high post-harvest losses; access to water is limited because 96 percent of agriculture in the region is rain-fed.
The small-scale farmers also lack the capacity in finance and volume to start viable businesses and take part in the existing value chains.
Access to decent work and employment is a major challenge to some youth and women from rural communities.
As a result, there is widespread poverty, especially in the northern regions of Ghana among women and children. The small-scale farmers also lack the needed capacity to identify and take advantage of the few available business opportunities in the agricultural commodity value chain.
The few pockets of available potential business cases are challenged with; limited finances to propel their business growth, and capacity to effectively manage their businesses, among others so as to grow their businesses into competitive commercial businesses
Fertile land is another issue required to increase crop productivity, however, the experience is that almost all farmlands used continuously by the women farmers are low quality (infertile) but they still struggle to get something home while the fertilised ones in the care of the men
Inorganic fertilisers applied to farms are of little benefit to plant growth due to leaching. This is due to the lack of humus in the soil, poor porosity, and poor soil structure among others.
On climate-resilient farming, drip irrigation and SMART farming for sustainable agricultural productivity, the erratic rainfall patterns manifest their impacts in reduced crop yields since crops do not have enough water for the entire growing season.
Climate change vulnerability in Ghana is said to be greatest for those who already experience high poverty, have limited access to alternative livelihoods, are strongly dependent on natural resources and have the lowest capacity to cope with these changes.
Female-headed households and smallholder farmers are the most at-risk groups hence the need for the provision of irrigation dams to ensure year-round crop production to boost food security.
The plants and fertiliser Act of Ghana which seeks to provide information on the plants including the procedures and precautions in chemical applications are not well understood by the farmers and needed intensive awareness creation to educate the farmers on the adherence to the laws to patronise certified seeds for their productions.
Livestock production is a major source of livelihood, income and employment for many farmers and also a coping mechanism to reduce the climate change impacts. As a result, the government unveils a flagship program on Rearing for Food and Jobs to promote the livestock sector. This programme has also helped some farmers to generate some revenue for their families and also inject it into their productions to increase their businesses.
It is said that a lack of skills in good agronomic practices, access to tractor services or other machinery, access to land and productive resources especially for women, low soil quality, high post-harvest losses, access to water is limiting and agriculture is hampered by the activities of farmers to produce to meet the demands of the market.
There is therefore the need for government and stakeholders to adhere to the cry of the farmers who put food on the table to address their grievances.
Savannah Women Integrated Development Agency (SWIDA – GH), a non-governmental organisation, also called on stakeholders in the agricultural sector to empower rural women farmers with adequate information on modern agricultural practices for increased productivity.