Ministers, MPs must go into farming after terms of office - Lecturer

A policy analyst and lecturer with the Kumasi Technical University has called on President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to consider securing the “future” of parliamentarians and ministers of state by getting them into agriculture with half of their ex-gratia after their terms of service.

Mr. Thomas Kusi Boafo is of the firm belief that his proposal if considered would push ministers and Members of Parliament to begin making meaningful contributions to develop the agriculture potentials of the country.

Speaking to Ultimate News’ Ivan Heathcote – Fumador, the chattered accountant who is himself a large scale farmer insisted that members of the executive and the legislature could better influence the success of government’s flagship Planting for Food and Jobs programme if they were direct stakeholders in farming in Ghana.

He explained, “If we all claim that Ghana is an agrarian country, I strongly suggest that half of ex-gratia of all our parliamentarians and ministers should be used to buy tracks of land. Immediately you finish your term of office, you are settled unto your farmland and if you will plant cocoa, corn or poultry, you begin working.

“If they begin planting and doing the poultry and fish farming, the whole country will be encouraged and they will make better policies from a point of knowledge when formulating policies. We will see if a policy maker will send for chicken to be imported from Brazil if he has a poultry farm here in Ghana,” he added.

Government is looking at revamping the country’s agricultural growth for food security and job creation following years of dwindled yields.