The Minister for Food and Agriculture has advised against panic buying and selling following the ban on the export of grains in the country.
According to Bryan Acheampong, the government has put in place measures to ensure there is no shortage of food or price surge.
Additionally, the government he said is committed and ready to buy excess stocks from farmers to mitigate adverse effects of the ban.
The Abetifi Member of Parliament (MP) gave the assurance on Adom FM’s morning show Dwaso Nsem, Tuesday.
Preliminary assessment has revealed massive destruction of farm crops in the Bono, Bono East, Oti, Northern, North East, Savannah, Upper-East, and Upper-West regions
The prolonged lack of rain has left farms parched and crops withered, endangering the livelihoods of farmers and posing a serious threat to food security in the northern regions.
As a result, the government through the Ministry for Food and Agriculture on Monday announced a ban on the export of grains, including maize, rice, and soybean.
However, the Peasant Farmers Association are worried that the ban would force farmers to sell their produce at cheap prices to prevent produce from spoiling in their barns.
This according to them is because often demand and supply determine the prices of grains on the market.
But Mr Acheampong has said there is no cause for alarm.
“Any farmer who has grains in abundance should visit our district centres where we will buy and redistribute them so that farmers won’t sell at low prices or it won’t go bad.”
To stabilise food supply, he added that, the government plans to tap into the ECOWAS Grain Reserve and collaborate with the private sector to import up to 300,000 metric tons of maize and 150,000 metric tons of rice.
“With the measures we have put in place, we don’t expect food shortage so we don’t expect anybody to engage in panic because. In fact we anticipate that there will be a reduction in food prices,” he assured.
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