Parliamentarians assess Northern Rural Growth Programme

Members of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Food, Agriculture, and Cocoa Affairs, have toured projects being undertaken under the Northern Rural Growth Programme (NRGP) to assess their impact on the lives of the beneficiaries.

The tour, which gave members of the Committee a practical insight into the interventions of the NRGP for poverty reduction, is also to enable the Committee to further lobby Parliament to approve more resources for the project to implement its initiatives.

Projects visited during the three-day tour, which ended on Wednesday, include the 8.9 kilometre Apesika-Abom feeder road in the Kintampo North District - improved to help convey foodstuffs to market centres; Dishili Valley and Tuyini Valley Rice Fields in the Karaga District, which were cultivated under the Rice Sector Support Programme of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture.

Members of the Committee also interacted with value chain farmers at Jema in the Kintampo South District; Abom in the Kintampo North District; Dishili and Tuyini in the Karaga District; and Mabun in the East Gonja District, to assess how the projects had affected lives, as well as toured research fields of the Savannah Agricultural Research Institute at Nyankpala.

The NRGP seeks to contribute to an equitable and sustainable poverty reduction and food security among rural households using value chain approach to agricultural production.

It involves linking farmers to financial institutions, markets, warehousing, and feeder roads improvement, amongst others.

Mr Gabriel Kodwo Essilfie, Chairman of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Food, Agriculture and Cocoa Affairs, described the projects as impressive saying, ‘they are helping to reduce poverty amongst rural dwellers.’

Mr Essilfie said there was the need for government to provide soft loan packages for rural farmers to ensure that they (farmers) did not end up using all their incomes on servicing high interest-based loans.

He, however, urged farmers to promptly settle their commitments to financial institutions in terms of repaying their loans to encourage the banks to reduce their interest rates.

Mr Roy Ayariga, Coordinator of the NRGP, said given the right agronomic practices the country had the potential to export rice and urged farmers to take advantage of the programme to improve their incomes.

The farmers generally appealed for soft loans to enable them to improve their productivity.

The NRGP is implemented in 32 districts in Northern, Upper East, Upper West and Brong Ahafo Regions.