Ghanaian farmers may no longer experience post harvest losses. The government has through the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) set up the National Food Buffer Stock Company (NAFCO) to ensure food security and to insulate farmers against losses resulting from anticipated increases in production.
Most often the excess foodstuffs Ghanaian farmers produce for the market go to waste and experts say such a situation do not aid economic development for a developing country.
"There is no coordinated system in place to help them store excess food and it's enough demotivating factor for the farmers who toil to get us food. We also experience shortages in the supply of some foodstuffs. Some products are on the market for a while and disappear, so this company will ensure that food is available throughout the whole year", Chief Executive Officer of NAFCO, Mr. Eric Osei-Wusu explained.
In an interview with Public Agenda in Accra, he explained that the rationale behind this buffer stock is to deal with post harvest problems.
He noted there are no stocks in Ghana so in case of drought or other natural disasters it will become difficult to feed the displaced in society and that NAFCO will ensure emergency food preparedness in case of crisis.
He disclosed that through the World Food Programme (WFP), Niger is buying food from Ghana so in case such a situation happens in Ghana, the impact will not be heavily felt since there will be a buffer stock.
NAFCO also has the following mandate; to manage government's emergency food security, to purchase, sell, preserve and distribute food stuff, to mop up excess produce from all farmers in order to reduce post harvest losses resulting from spoilage due to poor storage, thereby protecting farm incomes and to facilitate the export of excess stock.
It is also expected to guarantee farmers an assured income by providing a minimum guaranteed price and ready market, to expand demand for food grown in Ghana by selling to all state institutions such as the military, schools, hospitals, prisons, etc., to employ a buffer stock mechanism to ensure stability in demand and supply and to carry out such other activities that are incidental to the attainment of the above objects or such other duties as may from time to time be assigned by the Minister of Food and Agriculture.
Mr. Osei-Wusu stated that another major reason for setting up the buffer company is that agents from neighbouring countries like Burkina Faso, Niger and Cote D'Ivoire buy food cheaply from Ghanaian farmers during bumper harvest and when there is shortage come back to sell to the people.
He is very hopeful that NAFCO will be able to salvage this situation. On the issue of pricing, he maintained that in spite of the fact that there is no price control in Ghana the company employs a guarantee pricing mechanism that takes into consideration every factor that goes into production.
"This minimum guarantee price is simply the cost of inputs into the farm plus a 15 percent profit. This doesn't restrict the farmers to at all circumstances sell their products to us. If the farmer believes the market is good, he or she can go ahead and sell, but when there is no market, we will offer this minimum guaranteed price to them. This is just to ensure that farmers are not pushed into bankruptcy".
The CEO said that for now the major distribution process will be state agencies, saying that they are in talks with the agencies such as government hospitals, the various security agencies and educational institutions.
He admitted that storage facilities are not enough, though they can be found in all regions except Greater Accra with most of them found in the Brong Ahafo region.
The company, he said, has bought large quantities of paddy rice and is in the process of milling them for storage.
Asked if NAFCO is a replica of the former Ghana Food Distribution Corporation (GFDC) under General Acheampong's regime, Mr. Osei-Wusu said they have similar traits but then some differences exist. GFDC, he observe, did retailing, whilst NAFCO will not be engaged in that.
However, he said the company will learn from past mistakes of the GFDC. Apart from NAFCO, the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) in line with its mandate to increase the productivity of the Ghanaian farmer has introduced a number of interventions.
These include; the introduction of block farms program which made it possible for mechanization and extension services to be spread out to cover a large acreage and a large number of farmers, increased subsidization of fertilizers and improved seeds and the injection of more tractors and other farm machinery and equipment for increased mechanization.
It is being claimed that these interventions coupled with good weather conditions over the last cropping season has led to a larger than anticipated increase in the production of cereals.
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