PROBLEMS OF AGRICULTURE IN GHANA
Hello, warmly welcome to
Ghanafarms, the number one blogspot on agriculture in the country. In my last
post, I talked about some of the importance of agriculture to our motherland
Ghana. We found out that Agriculture had benefited the country in many ways
some of which include the provision of food, serving as sources of raw
materials to industries, sources of employment as well as income to farmers and
many others. Today, I am going to talk about problems associated with
agriculture production in Ghana thus militating the country’s dream of becoming
self sufficiency in food production.
First and foremost, inadequate extension or technical personnel in the sector has made the production level to be stagnant. Education is the key to development without which one is powerless as the gunpowder. Farmers who produce agriculture products need training on the new and improved methods of production. Nowadays, many farmers have turned to the usage of chemicals to get rid of weeds on their farms due to the unavailability of farm hands. The problems with this chemical application is numerous ranging from killing of the useful micro and macro organisms in the soil, reduction of taste many root and tubers to killing of the farmer and his immediate family. It is therefore necessary for the technical officers to train farmers on the usage of the chemical, but in our country, the services of these officers has been neglected thus farmers use the chemicals anyhow and anywhere hence the low production of food production.
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| Infertile soils hinders food production |
Most
of the soils around has lost its fertility due to continuous farming and
numerous outbreak of bush fire. Due to the continuous cropping of many root and
tubers and cereals which use much of the soil nutrients, many of our soils have
not been able to yield as expected. Hence, there is the need to replace the depleted nutrient in
the soil that result in poor harvest. It is therefore incumbent on technical
officers to teach farmers on the methods of regaining the soil fertility to
improve food production.
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| Most farmers still use hoe and cutlass |
The
subsistence production in Ghana is another challenge in the development of
agriculture in the country. Subsistence farming is the type of farming where
the farmer produces food and other agricultural product for consumption by the
farmer and his or her family and the surplus are sold. In a situation, where
the farmer’s product are grown for sale the resource of the subsistence economy
is said to be commercial. The challenge with subsistence farming whether
commercialize or not is the limited capital input. The methods employed tend to
be traditional – the hoe and cutlass are the common implements still used.
There is limited use of tractor or animal power for cultivation. Due to this,
the country still depends on other country for food.
The system of land holding is
also problematic. In this country, the land holding is based on the principle
of traditional communal rights. The communal system of land holding does not
encourage economic use of land for agricultural purposes. Hardworking farmers
cannot use communal land as security for obtaining loans loans from financial
institutions because they do own the land. Furthermore, where land is shared
among the number of individual as part of traditional inheritance system it
leads to fragmentation. Land available for individual farming activities get
smaller and this adversely affects the efficiency of farming and the
productivity of the land.
Another problem is lack of record
keeping on part of some farmers. Record keeping helps farmers to evaluate the
performance within a given period of time. This will tell them success and failures ,where they are failing they can
put some measures in place to check these failures. In a situation where the
farmer does not keep records its becomes very difficult to access his or her
progress, and this is what happens in, Ghana
many of them do not keep records.
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| Environmental diseases hinder crop yields |
Diseases and pests outbreak
is another problem militating against agriculture production in Ghana. Many problems can arise when growing arable
crops, vegetable as well as cash crops and rearing of farm animals. These can
cause by diseases and pests. Diseases
reduces the quality of agricultural products thus reduces its market value. The
pests, mostly insect and their larvae. They cause mechanical damage to crops,
farm animals. They also spread diseases. Furthermore, an outbreak of bush fires
and environmental diseases hinders agricultural development. These and many others are some of the problems
with agriculture here in Ghana.
Please do leave your
comments and subscribe to the blog for quick updates. Our next topic to be discuss
will be on Soil fertility. Do make a day with me until then take good care.
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| Diseases and pest affects agriculture development |
