The Chief Executive Officer of the Chamber of Agribusiness Ghana, Anthony Morrison, has called on the government to establish a comprehensive national agriculture database to regulate imports and protect local farmers from market distortions.
His comments come in the wake of recent reports that Ghanaian tomato traders were attacked by insurgents in Burkina Faso while sourcing produce, an incident that has sparked concern about the risks traders face when travelling outside the country to secure agricultural goods.
Speaking on the issue on the Citi Breakfast Show on Tuesday, February 17, Morrison argued that Ghana’s continued dependence on imported agricultural commodities, even when local production exists, reflects a structural policy gap that can be addressed through data-driven planning.
According to him, a well-structured agricultural information system would not only help authorities regulate imports more effectively but also empower local producers, stabilise markets, and reduce the dangers traders face when crossing borders for supplies.
He explained that the Chamber has long advocated the creation of such a system to track production levels across the country and guide decision-making on import permits.
“The Chamber has proposed over the last 10 years that, as a country, we have come of age, and there is a need for us to build an agriculture information database where we know how many fields are under production for every commodity.
“So if somebody comes to apply for a permit to import a certain quantity of a product, we use the database to tell the person that if you are importing 50,000 tonnes, the database should be able to tell you that in the next month, these are the quantities that are going to be harvested locally so your 50,000 import permit cannot be approved.
“Because the problem we are having is that by the time crops are harvested, the imported ones too are in and that is where the market disruptions and all the post-harvest losses start happening.”
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