Best Farmer calls for a paradigm shift in farming to address poverty

Mr Maxwell Akandem, Chief Executive Officer of Akandem Farms has appealed for support for smallholder farmers to shift away from old ways of subsistence farming.

He said there was the need to move away from farming for consumption to a new paradigm of taking agriculture for business to improve income levels.

He said most smallholder farmers lacked cost-benefit analysis of their production, coupled with the annual post-harvest challenges, and poor agronomic practices.

“Farming only for consumption is a major concern if the region has to attain sustainable food production.”

The Chief Executive Officer made the acknowledgement in an interview with the Ghana News Agency at Sandema in the Builsa District during the training of agricultural staff that would provide technical support to the WRS.

The 2010 first runner-up of National Best Farmer said Akandem Farms was linking with the Ghana Commodity Exchange, through the Warehouse Receipt system WRS) that was implemented by the International Finance Corporation of the World Bank Group and supported by the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs(SECO) for a better alternative in agribusiness for smallholder farmers.

He said the outfit as an agribusiness organisation, which produced maize and other grains was helping to support farmers to produce using proper agronomic practices and ensuring farmers moved away from the traditional systems for better business.

He stressed that the linkage of farmers to the Ware House Receipt System (WRS) by his outfit served as an enabler for farmers to produce according to specifications for the new structured trade to enhance their incomes and reduce poverty in the Builsa district.

“The Ghana Commodity Exchange (GCX) is going to be different from the old agricultural trading system since it dealt with quality issues and noted that it came with an electronic trading system, which was different from the traditional system, where traders dictated prices of commodities in the market” Mr Akandem noted.

Mr Akandem thanked the IFC and the World Bank for the WRS project and indicated that farmers stood to gain through the commodity exchange, following the requirements and specifications of grains and urged the farmers to take the intervention serious to boost their incomes.

The WRS project is a technical assistance and advisory services project aimed at setting up a well-functioning, regulated warehouse receipt system expected to facilitate increased access to credit to farmers and the supply chain, linkage to structured markets and reduces post-harvest storage losses.