Five women honoured at Shai Osudoku Farmers’ Day celebrations

Five out of twelve awardees at the 2019 Farmers’ Day celebrations in the Shai Osudoku District of the Greater Accra Region including the 1st and 2nd runners-up were women.

Three others picked up the awards in different categories at the colourful ceremony held at Odumse.

Ultimately, it was 57-year-old farmer, Ibrahim Abubakar Asebi who was adjudged the 2019 district best farmer for Shai Osudoku.

The winner has been farming for the past 25 years, producing maize and pepper as well as rearing livestock.

He owns 6 acres of maize, 3 acres of pepper, 654 cattle, 65 goats, 152 local fowls, 56 guinea fowls, 84 sheep and 50 pigeons.

The Shai Osudoku District Best Farmer award comes with a tricycle, a pair of wellington boots, 4 cutlasses, 1 full piece of cloth, 1 knapsack sprayer, 2 plastic chairs, 1 plastic mini bucket, Lan T soy milk, 2 plastic food containers, a crate of egg and T-Roll. The prizes saw asignificant improvement from the previous editions.

Mr. Abubakar had his prize presented to him by the District Chief Executive for Shai Osudoku, Daniel Akuffo at the event’s 35th edition.

In a citation, the overall district best farmer was praised for his good agronomic practices, knowledge of husbandry practices and fairly good farm records, easy adoption and implementation of technologies and good farm sanitation.

Mr. Abubakar took the ‘sword of honour’ from the 2018 winner, Stephen Olegor who hails from Osuwem.

Two women, 52-year-old widow with 5 children, Selina McCarthy from Kongo and Cynthia Quarshie from Agomeda took the 1st Runner-Up and 2nd Runner-Up positions respectively.

Selina McCarthy who cultivates mango, maize, okra, cucumber, pepper and rears fowls went home with a large-sized freezer, a pair of wellington boots, 4 cutlasses, 1 full piece of cloth, 1 knapsack sprayer, 2 plastic chairs, 1 plastic mini bucket, Lan T soy milk, 2 plastic food containers, a crate of egg and T-Roll.

Cynthia Quarshie also went home with a medium-sized freezer and all the above items.

Nine others, including the best crop farmer, Olivia Afi Ahedor, best livestock farmer, Daniel Agbeko, best physically challenged farmer, Ebenezer Lomotey, best Agric extension worker, Emmanuel Gbetsivi, best aquaculture farmer, Silver River Agric Company Limited, best rice farmer, Regina Ayorkor Mensah, best women farmer, Naane Beniana, best youth farmer, Wisdom Elekusi Saisi and a special award winner in planting for Food and Jobs, Lee Frimpong and Dr. Afrane Farms, were also recognized and honoured with appreciable prizes like burners and cylinders, refrigerators, flat-screen TVs, wax prints, cutlasses, wellington boots, knapsack sprayers, and other items.

Speaking at the durbar held to observe the event, the District Chief Executive for Shai Osudoku, Daniel Akuffo congratulated the award winners for their selfless and devoted contributions towards food provision for the people of the district and the entire nation as well as the Agric Director, his team and the Planning Committee for putting the event together.

He added that the choice of the theme for this year's event, ‘Enhancing Small Scale Agriculture towards Agribusiness Development’, excites him .Stating that, “because our District which is purely agrarian will not see much self-development without agribusiness embedded in our farming culture.”

While lamenting that agriculture in the Shai Osudoku District over the years has functioned on the survival basis with just few farmers focusing on it as business, Mr. Akuffo called for prioritization of agribusiness to serve as incentive to attract the youth into the business.

“I am much convinced that, as a District, we must gradually shift the focus of Agriculture from a small scale farming approach to an agri-business to attract many young people unto the agricultural train,” he called.

He also commended farmers for accepting the Planting for Food and Jobs and the Rearing for Food and Jobs programme to produce a bumper harvest and export food to various countries and appealed to them to give even greater support to other policies in agriculture.

The assembly chief touted the contributions of the Kpong Irrigation Scheme, one of the largest irrigation schemes in the country and the Mango plantations to the agrarian status of the Shai Osudoku District and disclosed that the Assembly had started a process by partnering with some investors to establish a factory through the One District One Factory (1D1F) Flagship programme.

Mr. Akuffo also disclosed that Government under the Modernisation of Agriculture in Ghana (MAG) Project, has for the second successive year, received funding from the Canadian Government to support Extension Service Delivery activities of the Department of Agriculture where the Agric Directorate has been supplied with a Nissan Pick-Up and 24 motor bikes.

He also gave updates on developments in various areas of agriculture in the district including fisheries, poultry/livestock industry, budgetary and other support to agriculture, planting for food and jobs, fall army worm, Ghana productive safety net project and patronage of locally grown agricultural produce.

Dr Sam Ugoh-Oscar who chaired the day’s activities praised “the courage of the peasant farmer” and their spirit of resilience and optimism even in the wake of multiple challenges.

“Over the years, experience has shown that farmers may have to deal with multiple extreme problems in the course of the same cropping season. Farmers can experience droughts and floods in the same field in the same year which may result in crop loss, and on top of this, can cause outbreaks of pest and disease, so much trouble,” he observed.

The chairman however said government’s rural electrification programme was briefing a new lease of life to these farmers as they could acquire equipment such as video machines to feed the expansion of their farmlands.

He however expressed concern that such desires stood the risk of being hampered by the fragmentation of their lands which is direly unavailable and called for the need to give encouragement to small farmers for their immense contribution to global food production.

He identified the processing value chain as a major problem with agriculture, saying that efforts such as response to long-standing issues and challenges and facing newer realities were needed to curb these.

Dr Sam ‘Ugoh-Oscar who was confident that biotechnology and the public-private partnership model could be the game-changer suggested that government should look at providing farm extension services, enhance price realization, cut out intermediaries and improve the supply chain through forward and backward linkages.

District Agric Director, Mr. Simon Madodzi Addom, who recalled how agric was previously practiced as subsistence farming, lauded the contributions of agriculture to Ghana’s economy evident by its contributions to the GDP and lives dependent on it.

He was hopeful that transforming small scale agric from subsistence to commercial farming would not only attract the youth into it but also ensure natural food security in a sustainable manner.

The 35th Edition of the National Farmers’ Day was marked on Friday, 6th December, 2019 throughout the country.

The Farmers Day celebration, which was introduced by the erstwhile Provisional National Defence Council government in 1985, is aimed at recognising the vital role played by farmers and fishers in the country’s economy.

The programme was graced by dignitaries including traditional rulers, Deputy Greater Accra Regional Minister, the District Coordinating Director, Heads of Departments and Agencies, The Divisional Police Commander and Heads of Security Agencies, Former Assembly Members, Farmers and Representatives of Political Parties.