Fair Prices Can Save Cocoa Farms from Galamsey – Mahama
President John Dramani Mahama says the best incentive to boost Cocoa production in Ghana to pay farmers a fair price for their produce.
He believes that, this will deter farmers from selling their farmlands to illegal miners, commonly referred to as Galamseyers.
He made this known when he met Ghana Cocoa COffee Sheanut Farmers
Association(COCOSHE).
“The thing about the cocoa business is the bulk of the benefit of the cocoa industry should go to the farmer so that it incentivizes him to look after his cocoa farm and makes sure that he produces more. I can understand that Yes. Climate change is affecting the cocoa industry. I can also understand that Yes. Galamsey is also affecting the cocoa industry but the best incentive to keep cocoa production up is to pay the farmer a fair price for his cocoa.
“Because even though some of the Galamseyers force the farmers of the land, there are also some farmers who voluntarily give up their cocoa farms for Galamseyers to come and produce gold and share the gold with them and that is because they don’t see the value of the cocoa they are farming” he stressed.
He thus, pledged to revive the cocoa industry through incentives for farmers.
“This year will be what I call a year of correction because of what we have inherited from the past administration. We spoke about the rollover. Money was taken for cocoa but could not be supplied in the past cocoa season.
And so 333,000 tonnes debt of cocoa was handed over to them and so in this year’s production, they must pay the 333,000 tonnes which was sold at 2,600 dollars per metric tonne. So what is available to them is the difference between 333,000 and whatever might be the final figure of this year. This year will be a year of correction so that we can bring the industry back on track” he added.
