{"id":175250,"date":"2015-12-17T19:58:34","date_gmt":"2015-12-17T19:58:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/?p=175250"},"modified":"2015-12-17T19:58:34","modified_gmt":"2015-12-17T19:58:34","slug":"fertilizer-subsidy-programme-losing-relevance-send-ghana","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=175250","title":{"rendered":"Fertilizer subsidy programme losing relevance – SEND-Ghana"},"content":{"rendered":"

A report put together by the Northern Ghana Civil Society Organizations platform on agriculture spearheaded by SEND-Ghana has revealed that government\u2019s subsidized fertilizer programme is losing its relevance.<\/p>\n

As a pro-poor government programme introduced nationwide in 2008 to support smallholder farmers, the fertilizer subsidy programme among several factors is hindered by price variations.<\/p>\n

According to the report funded Care, the percentage of the price of subsidized fertilizer has declined from 50% to 21% between 2008 and 2015.<\/p>\n

It also emerged that compound fertilizer per 50 kilograms a bag worth GHc22.00 in 2008 skyrocketed to GHc89.00 in 2015 representing 295%.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_6505\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The report further attributed the situation to delay in supply of the products due to suppliers\u2019 unhappiness about government\u2019s credit worthiness.<\/p>\n

As a result of the importation of sub-standard products coupled with limited distribution in the districts, the subsidized fertilizers are inaccessible, the report pointed out.<\/p>\n

SEND-Ghana\u2019s Programmes Manager who doubles as a lead research officer, John Nkaw presented the report in Tamale at the Northern Ghana policy dialogue on the fertilizer subsidy programme.<\/p>\n

He said the report dubbed \u201cMaking fertilizer subsidy helpful to smallholder farmers\u201d sought to highlight factors affecting the programme and proffer possible solutions.<\/p>\n

The report recommended that government should spend 10% of the nation\u2019s Gross Domestic Product on the agric sector to boost food security.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_6501\"<\/a><\/p>\n

It admonished government to scale up its Private-Public-Partnership drive in the agric sector as means of generating enough revenue to maximize allocation and supply of the subsidized fertilizer.<\/p>\n

The report also urged government to adequately resource the Departments of Agriculture to expand their monitoring and supervision.<\/p>\n

Northern Regional Director of the Department of Food and Agriculture, Boakye Acheampong said agriculture remained government\u2019s topmost priority.<\/p>\n

He explained that the subsidized fertilizer programme was rotational during the distribution season.<\/p>\n

Majority of the participants from the three regions of the north raised alarm over the smuggling of the subsidized fertilizer into neighboring countries.<\/p>\n

They called for the strict enforcement of laws governing the subsidized fertilizer programme.<\/p>\n

In June 2008, government introduced a nation-wide fertilizer subsidy programme covering three types of inorganic fertilizer, Sulphate of Ammonia, Urea and Compound fertilizer.<\/p>\n

The programme was dovetailed with the agric sector as a rapid intervention to help increase food production at the peak of the global financial, food and energy crisis that was adversely affecting poor countries.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_6498\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The goal was to help farmers increase fertilizer application for increased production.<\/p>\n

Government\u2019s inability to fully finance the fertilizer subsidy programme in 2014 contributed to failure in meeting yield in targets for maize and rice and smallholder farmers struggled to buy fertilizer at commercial rates in the open market.
\n–
\nBy: Abdul Karim Naatogmah\/Citifmonline.com\/Ghana<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A report put together by the Northern Ghana Civil Society Organizations platform on agriculture spearheaded by SEND-Ghana has revealed that government\u2019s subsidized fertilizer programme is losing its relevance. As a pro-poor government programme introduced nationwide in 2008 to support smallholder farmers, the fertilizer subsidy programme among several factors is hindered by price variations. According to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":135298,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[38,17],"class_list":["post-175250","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-palaver-newspaper","tag-wassa-akropong"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=175250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175250\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/135298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=175250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=175250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=175250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}