Modern irrigation systems for Northern Region famrers
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Dubbed “The Sisili-Kulpawn Integrated Water Management Project,” the first phase of the projects will entail the construction of irrigation and drainage infrastructure for a scheme of 400 hectares, that comprises 250 hectares of model farms and 150 hectares of irrigated small-holder farms.
When completed fully, about 40,000 hectares of land, supporting out-grower and smallholder farmers in rain-fed and irrigation farming, would be put under cultivation.
Funding for the first phase of the project was secured from the Dutch government, under its sustainable water fund facility, Wienco Ghana Limited and the Savannah Accelerated Development Authority (SADA).
At a stakeholders forum in Accra to launch the project, a minister of state at the presidency in charge of Development Authorities, Alhaji Mustapha Ahmed, said the objective of the project was to support peasant farmers to move up the value chain from subsistence farming to medium and high-value farming.
The project has been designed to reap the full benefits of the entire value chain in agricultural enterprise from produce to high quality products for internal and external markets.
It is also expected to open up employment opportunities for the teeming youth in the catchment area, improve the income levels of the people and increase agricultural output.
Alhaji Ahmed said the partnership between the SADA and its development partners was timely to solving the challenges farmers faced in the northern part of the country.
“The forging of these strategic partnerships with private sector operators is crucial for the harnessing of the combined strengths of the private and public sector towards transforming the lives and livelihoods of our brothers and sisters in the SADA zone,” he said.
He said the project would address the problems of farmers having to wait until the raining season before they could commence production, adding that “with dry season irrigation, the seven months of inactivity in the north can be reduced”.
In order for the SADA to be successful, Alhaji Ahmed appealed to Ghanaians to minimise the “politicisation” of development activities.
The Director of the SADA, Alhaji Gilbert Iddi, said the Sisili-Kulpawn integrated water project would be the largest of all SADA initiatives.
He said the SADA had so far been able to use water pumps to irrigate lands along the Volta River in the growth poles at Buipe and Yapei for the cultivation of butternut, a high value crop which was currently being exported to the United Kingdom.
Touching on the role of the SADA in the project, he said SADA would facilitate stakeholder participation in baseline surveys, design and start-up of pilot farms and the identification of smallholder farmers.
“SADA will also provide investor protection and additional support in business case development to upscale the project,” he said.
By Dominic Moses Awiah/Ghana