A cocoa farmer in Ogome, a suburb of Somanya, the capital of Yilo Krobo Municipality in the Eastern Region, Mr. Paul Kwao has complained claiming government is “insensitive” towards enhancing cocoa production in the country.
According to the “backyard cocoa farmer”, the decline in cocoa production is partly that farmers are losing interest in the cocoa farming and thus diverting to different crop cultivation.
He said the previous government led by the National Democratic Congress supported cocoa farmers through free fertilizers that help them to increase cocoa farming activities.
President Addo Danquah Akuffo Addo’s led government has subsidized the price of a bag of fertilizer for GHC 80 which Mr. Kwao Paul claimed farmers cannot afford thereby leading to the decline in the cocoa sector.
Speaking in an interview with a Somanya based Rite FM to a sit-in-host Dr. Kenneth Oliver; Mr. Paul said some extension officers are not helping them to solve their problems but adding to their challenges.
He said that aside the black pod disease which affects cocoa, there is a new disease by name swallow shoot which is very alarming but any time they consult extension officers they are only told to practice pruning which they (farmers) are illiterate of.
Meanwhile, government through Ghana Cocoa Board has announced among other things rehabilitation programme which sought to eradicate diseased cocoa farms as well old unproductive farms with the aim to increase cocoa production from the current 800,000 tons to over 1 million tons.
Report further says the COCOBOD has put in place various interventions and best agronomic practices to help double the output of cocoa between now and 2027.
In the current 2016/2017 crop year, COCOBOD is again nursing 60 million hybrid seedlings in over 332 nursery sites across all cocoa growing regions for free distribution to cocoa farmers.
Source; Prince Paul Amuzu/ritefmonline.org/princeamuzu667@gmail.com
