The Minister for Food and Agriculture (MOFA), Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto, has indicated that Ghana’s food security is firmly assured under the government’s flagship program ‘Planting for Food and Jobs (PFJ).

He says the program has not only improved the country’s food security but the subregion’s too, as the Planting for Food and Jobs, had qualified Ghana to become the “breadbasket of West Africa.”

The minister said most states in West Africa rely on food surpluses produced in Ghana as food security buffers. He said this at the commissioning of newly acquired farming equipment under the “More Food Program” in Accra yesterday. Dr. Akoto explained that farming machinery is part of the farming mechanization agenda of the country.

He said the new equipment is the last of the third tranche of the Brazilian US$96 million loan facility to boost food production in Ghana. The machines, which include 50 combine harvesters, 30 Massey Ferguson tractors, 70 Valtra tractors, 50 Hew Holland tractors, and 57 LS Plus, totaled to worth US$30.

The concessionary loan, which was acquired in 2012 to purchase and distribute modern farming equipment to support small-scale farmers, aimed at reducing food importation and food security concerns in Ghana. The farming equipment distribution project is classified as a module under the planting for food and jobs program.

The project also seeks to introduce modern harvesting techniques, address post-harvesting losses, and bring value addition to farm produce. Thus, the ministry would soon be adding to the farming equipment processing machines for cassava, plantain, and others.

Dr. Akoto further told the media after an inspection of the equipment that the government is in expectance to make cashew, shea, mangoes, rubber, coconut, and oil palm the next cash crops after cocoa. The tree crop (module 2) would earn Ghana US$12 billion annually in foreign exchanges. However, the development of the tree crop would have full-scale financial bearings on the economy medium-to-long term.

The minister said tree crop development is the second module under planting for food and jobs. He says since the project is new, the people “would not see the impact [now] till the next five, six years.

Dr. Akoto indicates that the other modules under planting for food and jobs were food security (module 1), greenhouse development (module 3), and livestock (module 4).