Smallholder farmers push for subsidies on fertiliser

By Ama Amankwah Baafi
Smallholder farmers have prevailed on the government to live up to its promise to increase subsidies on retail prices of fertilisers, seeds and other agrochemicals.

Subsequently, they proposed that subsidy, particularly on the fertiliser component, should be pegged at 50 per cent less than the current price to help enable farmers who do not often use the product to do so to increase their yield.

The Programme Officer of the Peasant Farmers Association of Ghana (PFAG), Mr Charles Nyaaba, in an interview with the Daily Graphic in Accra further urged the government to consider the proposal of the farmers before the farming season began between April and June, this year.

He explained that a 50 per cent subsidy will help accomplish the rationale behind the Fertiliser Subsidy Programme (FSP), which is meant to encourage farmers, particularly smallholder farmers, to increase the application of fertiliser on their farms.

When the Fertiliser Subsidy Programme (FSP) was introduced in 2008, there was a 50 per cent subsidy component which declined to 21 per cent in 2015, representing a reduction of about 58 per cent.
Mr Nyaaba noted that access to fertiliser at the right time at the beginning of the farming season was critical to guarantee good yield.

“In terms of fertiliser subsidy, it is something they can do immediately because the FSP is announced in March / April. Last year for instance market price for 15x15kg of fertiliser was between GH₵105 and GH₵110. This dropped to GH₵89 after the subsidy was introduced so the subsidy component is less than 20 per cent, making the price high,” he said.

Concern of farmers
Farmers have often complained that the upward price changes of fertiliser affected the amount of fertiliser they could afford to used on the farm.
Experts have said that fertiliser was a key determinant of high crop yields, adding that as part of efforts to ensure that the country became food secure, farmers’ access to fertilisers should be of interest to all.

New government’s vision
The government, per its pledges, seeks to modernise agriculture, improve production efficiency, achieve food security and profitability for farmers to significantly increase agricultural productivity in the next four years.

Recommendation
The PFAG has urged the government to introduce measures, including effective monitoring, to prevent price variations in subsidised fertiliser across the country.
Indeed, it had on several platforms called for certain taxes to be dedicated to improving agricultural productivity, particularly the FSP.

Quick Read
Since the inception of the FSP, initiated in 2008 to help farmers increase their use of fertiliser, an amount of GH¢345 million has been invested out of which a total of 724,000 metric tonnes (MT) of fertiliser were distributed to farmers nationwide.