AGRITECH STAKEHOLDER CONSULTATIVE MEETING

Agrico Hub, a Business Innovation Hub seeking to build an entrepreneurship ecosystem to sustain innovative businesses for social impact in the Bono East region in partnership with Ghana Tech Lab with support from Mastercard Foundation, Young Africa Works, World Bank and the Ministry of Communication, organized a consultative stakeholder engagement on the 9th of June, 2022 between the hours of 9:00 am and 1:00 pm under the theme “ The Role of Agrictech in Transform the Local Economy for Job Creation and Economic Development”. Major actors in the Agricultural value chain were featured in this event to dialogue on how to integrate digitalization into Agriculture

A good number of stakeholders from the six pillars (Government and Policy, Support, Finance, Market, Media and Culture, Human Capital) participated in the meeting with representatives from Municipal Health Directorate, Ghana Education Service, Business Resource Center, Business Advisory Board, National Service NGOs, Media, Cal Bank, and others. 

Mr. George Antwi Boasiako, the CEO of Agrico hub in his welcome address highlighted on the contribution of Agrico hub and its partners in building the capacity of the youth in the Bono East region. He pointed out the number of trainingAgrico hub through Ghana Tech lab and partners have done over the years and listed the impacts these training have created in the lives of the youth. He also pointed out specific people who have greatly benefited from the training. According to him, this year’s training is focused on Web development with a specialization in Agriculture for thirty (30) youth. It will be a six months project with different sections. He made it known that, the training itself will be six weeks followed by either incubation or internship.  He concluded by calling on all stakeholders present to support the hub in achieving this purpose.

The stakeholders took turns to share their views on how the Agricultural sector can improve by leveraging on Technology. The keynote speaker, Lawyer Samuel Fenbeti, highlighted the legal implications of the use of agrochemicals. He said, “The health implications of bad agricultural practices affect crops and animals as well”. According to him, once a chemical is certified and approved to be on the market, there is nothing to be done. He continued by saying that “Not everything illegal is criminal. However, if what you do affects your neighbor, you can be sued”. He pleaded with the environmental and veterinary officers to deepen their education and inspection of farms.

The Municipal Director of Health, Dr. Fosuhene in his speech touched on the health issues in our agricultural practices. He made it known that, there is low production of organic crops but it has a premium value. He highlighted the overuse of pesticides and chemicals in farming, use of poisonous unhygienic water as irrigation for farming, the galamseymercury which is applied on land and the application of pesticides without the use of protective masks or gadgets by farmers. 

Madam Ivy Yeboah, the Human Resource Manager at the Business Resource Center applauded the hub for the partnerships with these stakeholders and for the massive impacts in these young people. She urged and encouraged the hub to continue with the good works. She ended by highlighting on the challenges in the agriculture sector. Among these challenges were land tenure system, lack of access to credit facilities, inadequate storage facilities and means of preservation.

The Regional IT director at the Bono East Regional Coordinating Council, Mr. Victor Danquah, enlighten the stakeholders on digitalizing agriculture. In his speech he said, farmers must be smart and also make their farms smart. According to him, “All partners in our agric sectors have failed because most of pour farm produce we eat is from outside the country”. He went further to explain that, farmers cannot have direct access to farm markets. Middlemen or market queens pre-finance farmers and they end up losingtheir produce to them with less profit.  He encouraged farmers to make use of apps and websites that can help manage one’s farm and access to market. He ended with these few words “The new era is agrictech, so as farmers, if you cannot osetechnology, you can involve you children”. 

The representative from Cal Bank, educated the stakeholders on how farmers can access facilities. He pointed out that, Cal Bank has N APP Where farmers can upload their products which should be nicely branded on the app and buyers will pay and buy. He said “It is risky to give loans to farmers because there is a lack of insurance coverage for the agricsector. He concluded by saying that, Cal Bank is considering supplying farm inputs to farmers and they pay as a way of grants.

Mr. Isaac Oppong, the Municipal Director of the Business Advisory Center at Atebubu educated that, the use of agrochemicals without protective gadgets can affect male potency. He advised the youth to venture into agriculture by starting in a small way in small quantities.

Some of the activities that went on during the program were, Open forum and panel discussion, networking, Breakout session and Policy commitment. 

The event ended with a speech from the keynote speaker who said that, agriculture has a great potential of creating employment opportunities for the youth, however it will take a concerted effort by all players in the agricultural value chain to maximize it potentials. “We must adopt modern systems of Agriculture which does not require much physical human effort in the production, cultivation and marketing of farm products and this is made possible through the adoption of agricultural technology (Agritech)”.