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ECONOMICS

CEO of Agri-Impact advocates for Greenhouse technology to achieve food security

The Chief Executive Officer of Agri-Impact Group, Daniel Acquaye has advocated for the establishment of more Greenhouse Technology centers across the country as a tool to ensuring food security of the citizenry.

Date Created : 7/24/2023 12:00:00 AM : Story Author : Dominic Shirimori/Ghanadistricts.com

According to him, though the technology is gradually becoming popular in Ghana, there is room for improvement to achieve greater impact. “We’re happy to see the greenhouse technology becoming popular now. Eight years ago we’re only few in the industry”, and people usually would refer to them as the “canopy” but today there are visible projects for people to identify with.

Citing the Example of Spain, Mr. Daniel Acquaye said the city of Almeria, which used to be a dessert was transformed into a forest of vegetables full of green houses. “It has become one of the vegetable hubs for the whole of Europe. They export about 2.8 billion dollars per annum, which is about our cocoa exports or even more; and domestic market, they make about 2.9 billion dollars providing over 100 thousand employments”.

"That is the model we want to replicate in Ghana, where we can have enclaves of greenhouses, and be able to produce for ourselves and for export, while generating employment for the youth", he emphasized.

In light of this, he said Agri-Impact is collaborating with the National Service Scheme to engage and train more youth in Greenhouse Technology and other agri-business models to make available these skills for utilization.

According to him, one of the factors dragging the expansion of the green house technology in the country is acceptance level of people, adding that people usually take time to accept innovations and buy into opportunities. "The people you want to sell an idea to, sometimes the turnaround time is so long and if you are not determined somewhere along the line you may drop that vision"

He asserts that one thing that he has observed positively however is that, these days agriculture and agri-business have been elevated with a number of investors coming into the sector; which is a positive development for agriculture.

HE indicated that Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has projected that by 2050, food consumption might even double and the world would have to produce more using the same space; and this is where technology comes in handy to ensure that happens.

The CEO also commended the Ministry of Finance and the Ghana Axim Bank as well as the Ministry of Agriculture for their support and keen interest in promoting Greenhouse Technology and wish that the technology can be replicated across all the regions to harness the potentials of the countries agriculture.