Ghana pledges 2,000 metric tonnes of grains to ECOWAS Food Reserve
Ghana on Wednesday took the lead to pledge 2000 metric tonnes of grains to the ECOWAS Regional Food Security Reserve (RFSR) as its contribution to achieving the stocks mutualisation.
The support, which would be made through the National Food Buffer Stock Company (NAFCO) in the 2019/2020 cropping seasons, is made up of 1000 metric tonnes of maize and 1000 tonnes of rice.
After the establishment of the RFSR, which Ghana is hosting two of its warehouses in the Northern Region, the initial stock of grains, made up rice, maize, millet and sorghum, was financed by the European Union.
Dr Sagri Bambangi, a Deputy Minister of Agriculture in charge of Annual Crops, announced this at a two-day sensitization workshop on Regional Food Security Reserve and Mutualisation in Accra.
The workshop seeks to educate policy makers, the public and relevant stakeholders on the importance of RFSR and also commence a discussion leading to the formulation of the Procedure Manual and the National Policy.
While the Procedure Manual highlights inventory and management procedures including transcription of good practices of the conduct of stock procedure, the National Policy would be based on regional guidelines on storage policies.
The Minister used the opportunity to sign a co-operation framework for the Network of Structures for the Management of National Food Security Stocks in the Sahel and West Africa, a document guiding the holding of stocks and its management by ECOWAS member nations.
Dr Bambangi said as part of efforts to ensure food security, the Government had completed 10 warehouses with the capacity of 1000 metric tonnes, with an additional 30 scheduled to be completed in June 2020.
He noted that the Government’s agenda to deliberately boost the agriculture sector was to make it the basis of its industrialisation.
“There has been keen and renewed interest in the agriculture sector now. Everyone is realizing that agriculture holds the key to the country’s development so issues of the sector is being discussed everyday in the media,” he added.
Dr Gle Koffi Emmanuel, the Head of Technical Unit, ECOWAS Department of Agriculture, Environment and Water Resources, said the RFSR was created on February 28, 2013 in Yamoussoukro, Cote d’Ivoire.
It was created by the ECOWAS Heads of State at their 42nd Ordinary Summit and seeks to improve the management of food crisis in the sub-region.
The idea to create the RFSR was born following the food crisis that hit West Africa in 2008.
Dr Emmanuel, also the Head of Technical Unit of Reserve Management, noted that the event highlighted the necessity to strengthen the emergency Food Security Reserve at National and Local levels, increasing the level of National public Stock and creating a solidarity mechanism at regional levels, thereby improving the co-operation between National Public Stocks.
Mr Kofi Amankwa, the Head of Operations at NAFCO, said the strategy adopted for RSFR was based on three lines of defence to assist a member state in the event of facing food crisis.
Per the doctrine of strategy the local stocks would be used first, followed by the national stocks, then if still unable to cope, the regional stocks would be used.
Mr Amankwa noted that each member state could request the use of the regional reserve provided it was facing food crisis and that Nigeria and Ghana had benefited from the stocks.
Source: GNA