Armyworms not defeated yet - Suhuyini

Farmers in the Tamale North constituency in the Northern Region have been provided with knapsack sprayers and other farm inputs by their Member of Parliament, Alhaji Alahassan Suhuyini, to deal with a despairing nationwide situation of fall armyworms which continues to march into farmlands causing massive destruction to crops.

According to latest figures, the insects have destroyed nearly 600 hectares of farmlands in the region in less than three months since it invasion, and aside from the struggle for potent pesticide to fight the fall armyworms, farmers in the region lack basic logistics to aid in the fight.

The figure is expected to rise as the farming season sets in.

Many poor farmers in the region, according to Starr News sources, have not been able to apply the “less ineffective” pesticide provided by the government following lack of some basic farming inputs as knapsack sprayers and fertilisers.

The situation has become a new biggest challenge crippling the fight against the fall armyworms in the region prompting the timely intervention of the MP who had earlier provided a machinery to plough farmlands of these poor farmers for no fee.

The MP provided one hundred (100) boxes of the knapsack sprayers and two hundred (200) bags of fertiliser to the constituents many of whom are into farming.

Speaking at Salamba where the inputs were handed over to a local party chairman for onward distribution to beneficiaries, Alhaji Suhuyini expressed worried about a statement made by the Agric minister suggesting the fall armyworm had been defeated.

He described the declaration as “unfair” and charged the ministry to launch thorough investigation into the situation and avoid it politicization.

“I think that the minister of Agric and other such agencies may have to consider the reports that are before them again because just interacting with some of the farmers here my information is that they still are struggling with the worms in some parts of the constituency in many of their farms; and so I wonder how that has been conquered.

I think that we need to go back to the drawing board. The farmers know that they are still being affected by the worms and so to say that it has been conquered- for whatever reason, I hope it is not political, I think it is not fair.

“Often I have received calls for support in that regard and when the rain dropped my mind started raising as to how to assist. I initially was able to procure a tractor which I located in our rural communities and a number of the farmers benefited from the assistance; they had their farms ploughed for free and we also had to consult widely with stakeholders and people who share our vision and fortunately through that consultation I have been able to procure 200 bags of fertilizer and 100 cartons of knapsack sprayers that I’m donating to our constituency chairman (chairman zack) who would then forward to the farmers in our community”, the MP indicated.

Alhaji Suhuyini pleaded with the beneficiaries to the accept effort and also charged them to keep the spirit of reorganising the NDC party alive to be able to recapture power in the next elections for much bigger interventions.