The Ghana Association of Vegetable Exporters (GAVEX) has hinted to Citi Business News it will be forced to lay off some workers as a result of the ban on the exportation of vegetables to the European Union Market by the Ministry of Food and Agriculture.
According to the President of GAVEX, Juliana Opuni, the decision will also make a lot of their produce go waste and lead to loss of revenue. The Ministry of Food and Agriculture earlier this week announced it had placed a temporary ban on the exportation of vegetables to the European Union.
The ban which takes immediate effect is on pepper, aubergines and gourd.
The sector minister, Fiifi Kwetey, explained that the ban follows an advice by the Food and Veterinary Office (FVO) of the European Commission.
In an audit report presented to Ghana by the FVO, “Ghana stands the risk of a ban from the European Commission as a result of improper documentation for exports and presence of pest on produce.”
At a stakeholder’s conference in Accra on Wednesday, Mr. Kwetey said the temporal ban will streamline activities of vegetable exporters and to make them adhere to world standards.
He stated, “In response to this advice, the ministry is issuing the following directives to be complied with henceforth;
A temporary ban of exports of pepper, aubergines and gourd till all issues are addressed to drastically reduce the levels of interceptions by the Food and Veterinary Office, FVO of the European Commission.
The Plant Protection and Regulatory Services Directorate, PPRSD, will step up and conduct thorough inspection of produce, increase the sampling size and enforce and ban all exporters who will flout guidelines and regulations,
That the PPRSD inspects and registers farmers sourced by exporters to ensure that vegetables are sourced from farms with no history of false codling Moth infestation,
The PPRSD is to review and enforce laid down standards separating procedures for effective monitoring of the supply chain. The PPRSD is to ban exporters of fresh vegetables not belonging to any registered associations recognized by PPRSD and sourcing from the unregistered farms. The sector minister, Fiifi Kwetey also indicated that they will be closely monitoring these subgroups to ensure that all unscrupulous practices that might destroy the promising export sector are stopped.
President of Ghana Association of Vegetables Exporters (GAVEX), Juliana Opuni, told Citi Business News, the Association will embark on training activities for farmers to enable them adhere to best practices.
Source: citifmonline
