Chief Executive Officer of the Savannah Accelerated Development Authority (SADA) Charles Abugre is hopeful that its ‘Commercial Agriculture Investment Guide: The Northern Savannah Ecological Zone of Ghana’ will unlock the massive agriculture potential of the northern regions.
The essence of the Investment Guide, Mr. Abugre explained, is to highlight the various agricultural potential held by the Savannah Ecological Zone — comprised of the three Northern regions, parts of the northern Volta and Brong Ahafo Regions — by providing relevant information such as land suitability, business environment indicators, inventory of natural resources for large-scale agriculture among others.
“The SADA zone holds major agricultural promise that when harnessed will not only make the country highly secure and less dependent on imports, but more importantly transform the lives of the zone’s inhabitants quite significantly — the zone currently records lower performances in all major indices of socio-economic performance compared to the national average,” Mr. Abugre said.
Speaking at the Investment Guide’s launch, Ekwow Spio-Garbrah-Trade and Industry Minister, said despite the role played by agriculture in the economy, it still faces considerable neglect by the relevant stakeholders.
According to the minister, neglect of the agricultural sector is further deepened by the fact there are no dedicated financial institutions lending to farmers for expanding their operations — adding that ADB Bank, which used to perform that function in the past, now appears to favour lending to other sectors of the economy.
Financial institutions that even want to lend to the sector, he contended, do so at higher interest rates which are too expensive for farmers.
“We need banks and financial institutions that lend to farmers at cheaper interest rates, at say 5-7 years so as to allow the farmers time to be able to recoup the returns on their investments,” he said.
Adam Sulley, acting Board Chairman of SADA, also reiterated the need for an eco-system of financing solutions to provide not only short-term but medium to long-term access to finance — which is the reason SADA is in the process of establishing the Northern Savannah Ecological Zone, a vehicle that will be provide for long-term financing needs.
Transformation of the savannah zone is modelled on the example of a successful savannah transformation story — the Brazilian Cerrado.
“The commercial agriculture guide presents findings born out of an intense collaboration between Ghanaian and Brazilian organizations — based on the belief that the success story about transformation of the Brazilan savannah could inform efforts to transform the Ghanaian and indeed West African savannah.”
The Investment Guide, which was produced in collaboration with Brazil’s Quieroz Galvao, is a component of the Northern Savannah Commercial Agricultural Masterplan currently under development by SADA.
The Guide will be made available at all of Ghana’s trade missions and embassies abroad, and on the website of the GIPC as well as SADA’s.