President Akufo-Addo has directed the Finance Ministry to raise a GH₵8 billion relief package to support farmers facing devastating losses due to an unrelenting dry spell in the eight regions in Ghana.
The Finance Minister, Dr Mohammed Amin Adam disclosed this at a press briefing on Monday.
The relief package will include cash transfers, food supplies, and other essential items for the affected farmers.
A technical task force, comprising officials from the Ministries of Finance and Food and Agriculture, will oversee the distribution to ensure fairness and accountability.
“Our response may not entirely neutralise the extent of the problem. But our response certainly will help in stabilising the situation until we get out of the crisis. And so, as the Minister for Food and Agriculture said, we are seeking to raise about $500 million, the equivalent of GH₵8 billion, to fund the crisis response programme,” he stated.
Expressing worry over the phenomena, Dr Amin said the funds are to be raised at a time when the buffers are almost depleted.
“This is difficult but we have to raise the funds. As a responsible and sensitive government as we are, the President has directed that we do everything within our power to find the money and fund the government response,” he added.
Giving the sources of the relief package, the Minister explained government has been able to secure up to $160 million which is about GH₵2.5 billion from the contingency fund.
Additionally, GH₵2.4 billion will come as support from development partners, including the World Bank.
For the assistance from the World Bank, Dr Amin noted its primary focus would be cash transfers and the provision of agricultural inputs to aid recovery efforts while that from the contingency vault will be used to bring in more grains to provide relief to farmers.
“So out of the GH₵8 billion we are seeking to mobilise, we can say that we have visibility of about GH₵5 billion that we want to use quickly to respond to the crises,” he added.
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
It has also led to wilting crops and significantly reduced harvests, forcing many farmers to abandon their fields altogether.
Source: Adomonline.com
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