[ 2016-01-28 ]

NPP will add 500k metric tonnes to cocoa – Bawumia
Cocoa production in Ghana will see a boost of
500,000 metric tonnes under an NPP administration,
Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, the party’s running mate
for the 2016 presidential election, has said.

He said “the vision of the NPP is to
aggressively pursue policies that will see the
addition of 500,000 metric tonnes to the current
output in 10 years.

“I have visited 22 villages in the Amenfi West
Constituency, since Sunday morning, interacting
with farmers and other constituents on issues of
development,especially the all-important cocoa
sector.”

He, therefore, urged cocoa farmers and all those
involved in the cocoa sector to support Nana
Akufo-Addo and the NPP since it is the party that
has demonstrated their capacity to grow the cocoa
sector with well-thought-out policies.

Speaking at Brekum, a cocoa-growing community in
the Amenfi West Constituency, during a two-day
tour of the constituency, Dr Bawumia recalled the
strides the cocoa sector made the sterling
leadership of President John Agyekum Kufuor and
the NPP and how the sector was now struggling and
declining under the NDC.

“If you look at this farm behind us, most of the
cocoa trees in it are dying. The cocoa industry
itself in Ghana is collapsing. If you look at the
cocoa sector in La Cote d’Ivoire and you look at
Ghana, there is a clear difference in how the
sector is going. Under President Kufuor, the NPP
raised cocoa production from 341,000 tonnes to
about 700,000 tonnes by 2008. Thanks to the good
work of the NPP, cocoa production hit the historic
1million mark in 2010/2011. This was due to
policies like the mass spraying and fertiliser
subsidy programmes, as well as other policies.”

“Now these have collapsed. The National
Democratic Congree (NDC) introduced politics into
the mass spraying policy, for example. They forgot
that cocoa farms are like a network and so if one
farm gets damaged, it would spread to other farms
and so it is not smart to discriminate like the
NDC has done, because it is farmers who create
wealth for this country and so by helping farmers,
you are helping Ghana. Any government that
politicises a sensitive issue such as cocoa is
only damaging Ghana. This is why the economy of
Ghana is going down at the same time cocoa is
going down”, he said.

Dr Bawumia explained to the farmers Nana
Akufo-Addo’s vision for the cocoa sector when
elected.

He indicated that the NPP would aggressively
pursue policies that would ensure that farmers
would produce 500,000 metric tonnes to add to the
current output in 10 years and that the
achievement of this vision would be hinged on
supporting the hard-working cocoa farmers to
produce more and bring more trees into
cultivation.

“Under the NPP, our view was that for Ghana to
do well, cocoa must do well. It is because of this
we introduced the mass spraying and fertiliser
subsidy programmes.”

Source - Graphic online

... go Back