Foodfest on May day

By Samuel Kwasi Obeng
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It is common knowledge that food is not only consumed to kill hungry pangs but to reduce body-stress and climax happiness. Food contains essential nutrients which revitalizes the body when consumed. In happy moments like festivals, naming, marriage, graduation and inaugural ceremonies and any other exciting moment you can think of, people normally break bread to crown their ecstasy and to make the day a memorable one. A little irony however exists in some aspect of Ghanaian funerals where people break bread and booze in an atmosphere of loud music, not quite different from what they do when they’re partying even though it is a mournful ceremony.
Another interesting moment in Ghana where food emerges as a major feature of the peoples’ mood is when Kumasi Asante Kotoko loses an important match, especially in Kumasi. In fact food vendors in Kumasi who cannot preserve their food for the next day have to assume a Santa clausian character or sell the food at a ‘donkomi’ price (very low price) otherwise they will pay more to the waste collector. This devil-and-the-deep-blue-sea situation is what my childhood friend Kofi would refer to as ‘two trouble one God’. When they win however, your guess at the amount of sales the food vendors make is as good as mine.
Food therefore plays an important role in basic human functioning and a special role in the tourism industry hence there is a sub sector under the industry called Food Tourism. It is also called culinary tourism but organisations like the World Food Travel Association (WFTA), an international NGO, stopped using ‘culinary’ since 2012 for the reason that the word creates an elitist impression about the Food Tourism industry. The United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) also maintains the usage of the term ‘Food Tourism’.
The term has drinks implied in it too. That is when we mention Food Tourism; we are not just referring to solid foods but also the beverages and water consumed by tourists. Having the definition of tourism in mind, one might be tempted to define Food Tourism as the activity of travelling outside one’s usual environment for not more than one consecutive year just for the purposes of food. However, people don’t travel just to eat food but people eat whenever they travel and the food they eat leaves lasting impression on their minds about the place they visited; “a way to a man’s heart is through his stomach”
It is in this light that the Ghana Tourist Development Company (GTDC), the investment wing of the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts (MoTCCA) has decided to promote Ghanaian dishes through a festival dubbed ‘Foodfest’. The festival which is going to be an annual ritual has giving preferential treatment to Ghanaian foods alongside foreign ones and promoting tourism among its main objects. The maiden edition of the Foodfest comes off this year on May 1 and 2 at the Efua Sutherland Children’s Park in Accra.
The festival has already been launched by the Deputy Minister for Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts, Mrs. Dzifa Abla Gomashie and I couldn’t agree with her more when she said we create jobs for other countries when we consume more of their produce than what we produce here in Ghana. Tourists come here to taste Ghana and once we succeed in finding our way into their hearts through sumptuous indigenous foods like Hausa Koko, Tom Brown, Tuo zafi, Fufu, Banku, Wakye, Pito, Palm wine and Sobolo, just to mention a few, we have created a bigger market, both within and without Ghana for the farmers to sell their produce – ‘you go where your heart is’.
Therefore, having a food festival where more indigenous foods would be served and eaten is one of the ways to solving a bigger economic malady that has plagued the Ghanaian economy for decades - the very unfavourable Balance of Trade. The GTDC must be commended for such a laudable initiative. However measures must be taken and put in place to ensure that this laudable initiative does not become a flash in the pan like the washed-up Presidential Special Initiatives (PSIs) which also encouraged the massive production and exportation of some indigenous produce.
It is good news that about 120 restaurants and chops bars have already registered to participate in the Foodfest, even though there are only 50 slots available for food vendors. Sad but I believe more slots would be made available in subsequent editions. It however means that food vendors in the country see it as a good platform to market their delicacies. Corporate Ghana and all stakeholders must therefore come on board to make it bigger as they also stand to benefit in many ways.
One very important point must not be missed here and that is food safety. It is at the heart of the success or otherwise of this festival. The GTDC must leave no stone unturned by ensuring that the food served at the festival is as safe as the manna from Heaven. Moreover, Groups like Service Excellence Ambassadors Foundation (SEAF) can use this platform to educate food vendors on hygienic and other best practices in the industry. It is not just about the spicy and nutritious Ghanaian dishes served but also, how it is served and the environment within which it is served matter a lot. These are all crucial to finding our way into the hearts of the tourists.
When we succeed in doing that, we’ve increased the world’s attention towards our motherland; they won’t only come to Ghana to enjoy our delicacies on subsequent editions of Foodfest but they will come and buy and invest in the our ideas. “Poverty is when you spend money on people’s ideas and no one spends money on your’s” – a favourite quote of Bishop Titi Offei.
Again, the date is May 1 to 2 and the event is Foodfest 2015, come and let’s taste Ghana and beyond.