Danida to Fund Irrigation

The Danish International Development Assistance (DANIDA), is to spend about 302 million cedis for the provision of irrigation facilities in four rural communities in the Wa District to promote dry season farming.

Under the pilot project, two existing dugouts at Kadoli and Yibile would be rehabilitated at a cost of 132 million cedis while 170 million cedis would go into the construction of new ones at Gudayiri and Yaru.

Dr. Elsher Tarp, Deputy Head of Mission of the Danish Embassy, said this when she called on the Upper West Regional Minister, Mr. Sahanan Mogtari at Wa with officials of the Savannah Resource Management Centre in Tamale, last on Wednesday.

They were on a three-day familiarisation tour of the region to assess problems facing DANIDA projects and to explore new areas for assistance.

Dr. Tarp said Ghana has adequate resources to put her in the middle-income category and pledged Denmark's readiness to assist.

DANIDA support for District Assemblies was being reviewed, she said, adding that future assistance for the decentralisation process would be in the form of strengthening capacity.

She expressed concern about the inability of district assemblies to pay staff of Area Councils and said the issue should be taken up seriously.

Mr. Mogtari praised DANIDA for its assistance in the region especially in the health, electricity and road sectors.

The Regional Minister appealed to the organisation to pay more attention to the training of health workers to man facilities, which are being under utilised due to the absence of qualified personnel.

He called for the strengthening of civil society groups like farmers associations and co-operative societies.

Mr. George Otsin, an official of the Savanna Resource Management Centre, said the provision of irrigation facilities is to prevent farmers from "plundering the environment" to earn a living during the long dry season.

He said the four communities benefiting would be monitored to see how they utilise the facilities.