BESSFA Rural Bank to support 2,500 farmers this farming season

About 2,500 small scale farmers would be supported by the BESSFA Rural Bank this farming season to help improve and promote food security in the Bawku area.

About Gh? 4 million is expected to be given out to the farmers as loans to enable them purchase inputs such as seeds, fertilizers, farm equipment among others.

Alhaji Hayatudeen Awudu Ibrahim, General Manager for the Bank disclosed this in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) at Garu in the Garu District of the Upper East Region said the Bank was committed to ensuring that farmers get the right tools needed for quality farming.

Alhaji Ibrahim noted that the purpose for establishing the Bank was to promote excellence in rural agricultural business to address food insecurity, and said the Bank was prepared to channel resources into agribusiness to encourage the youth to go into farming to produce more food for both consumption and export. He indicated that the support would foster the growth of the local economy by improving on the culture of Banking in the farmers, and expand acreages of farmlands which would invariably improve on food security. Alhaji Ibrahim disclosed that the Bank has so far support about 5,000 farmers in the previous years and said it was scaling up the numbers to enable more people participate in farming in the area. He said the Bank was in consultation with other stakeholders including the Department of Food and Agriculture of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MOFA) and Farmer Based Organizations (FBO) to educate farmers on the need to accept good farming practices to get better yields.

The Manager urged farmers to comply with the directives of the MOFA and stick to the methods and use the prescribed seeds given to them to enable them to get good harvest.

Mr Ibrahim advised other rural Banks across the country to create enabling rural banking environment for the youth to access loans for agricultural purposes to propel national development.

He noted that the future of agriculture depended on the youth and urged the Banks to institute flexible policies to encourage the youth to form farmer groups so that they could be supported with loans to enable them go into farming.