The Ghana Rice Inter-Professional Body (GRIB) has launched its 3rd Ghana rice festival, slated for October 7 and 8 2016.
The festival, which is geared towards the promotion of quality Ghana rice consumption and its health benefits to consumers, is under the theme “ Eat Quality Ghana Rice For A Healthy Life” while the slogan for the festival is “Eat Ghana Rice !!! It’s Fresh And Tasty!!!“
The ceremony was attended by the President for Ghana Rice Inter – Professional Body, John Kennedy Imoro Amoo, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) for the John Agyekum Kufuor Foundation, and a representative from the Ghana Grains Council, among others.
Addressing the gathering, the GRIB President called on the government to enforce measures which will discourage the illegal importation of rice.
“GRIB wants to take this opportunity to plead with government on behalf of our able rice farmers to close the inland borders that have been opened to bring in more foreign rice when we still have porous inland borders with a lot of unapproved routes for smuggling,” he said.
On his part, the CEO for the John Agyekum Kufuor Foundation, blamed past and current governments for the low patronage of locally-made rice.
According to him, successive governments have paid very little attention to the local rice industry.
“You will wonder why governments in the past, current and in the future are not taking this matter so serious. I am aware of the past governments, but the fact is that, the efforts of the past and present are not meeting our needs,” he said.
“In the early 70s, this nation was producing so much rice and was exporting rice to Burkina Faso under the programme called operation feed yourself. ”
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By: Philip Nii Lartey/citifmonline.com/Ghana