MINISTER LAUNCHES 'GROW AND EAT GHANA' CAMPAIGN (PAGE 21, OCT 17)

THE Minister of Food and Agriculture, Mr Kwesi Ahwoi, has launched the ‘Grow and Eat Ghana’ campaign to rally Ghanaians in support of the production, distribution and consumption of food grown and processed in Ghana.
Launching the project in Accra yesterday, Mr Ahwoi called on corporate bodies, food importing companies and consumers to come on board and, in conjunction with local farmers, promote and support the campaign.
The durbar of chiefs and people at which the project was launched also marked World Food Day, which was celebrated this year on the theme, “Achieving Food Security in Times of Crisis”.
The minister, whose speech was read on his behalf by the Deputy Minister of Food and Agriculture in charge of Livestock, Dr Alfred Tia, said it was regrettable that there had been a marked under-investment in African agriculture since the 1970s, leading to the importation of food into Africa to feed its people and refugees.
He expressed the hope that the World Food Summit scheduled for October 2009 would come up with key remedial actions to help move food security forward and eradicate hunger from the continent.
Mr Ahwoi appealed to the committee in charge of the TeleFood Project in Ghana to implement telefood activities to generate resources to assist local poor farmers and entrepreneurial youth.
The minister also appealed to corporate bodies and other institutions, both private and public, to freely go to the aid of the vulnerable in society to ensure that food security was achieved, especially in the rural areas.
He said the government had developed a medium term (2010 -2015) plan to implement a number of projects that would target a six per cent growth rate in the agricultural sector.
Mr Ahwoi said the target was informed by the need for an agricultural growth rate of about six per cent that ought to be sustained over a period of at least 10 years to ensure food security and rapid economic growth similar to that of middle-income countries.
The Officer in charge of the FAO sub-regional office for West Africa and FAO Representative in Ghana, Mr Musa Saibou Mbenga, who delivered a speech on behalf of the FAO Director-General, Dr Jacques Diouf, said the theme for this year’s celebration provided a clarion call to address the threat and challenges of food security.
He said it was time to invigorate all concerned and strengthen their resolve to dispense with complacency by putting together the right policies and programmes and move with a concerted effort to achieve the objectives of sustainable food security.
Dr Diouf said the FAO was ready to partner the government to consolidate both the short and medium-term measures put in place to mitigate the negative effects of the food crisis and those being established to ensure longer term sustainable food security and poverty reduction in the country.