The deputy minister of Food and Agriculture in charge of horticulture Hon. Osei Nyarko, delivering the keynote address at opening ceremony of this year’s long-awaited HortiFresh Fruit and Vegetable fair with the theme; Promoting Quality Fruits and Vegetables for a Competitive Domestic and Export Market, on 2nd July, 2019 at the La palm Royal Hotel, said, Hortifresh Fruit and Vegetable fair is a perfect platform to create visibility of businesses.
“This fruit and vegetable fair serves as a perfect platform to create visibility for businesses enterprise, create more linkages for growth and develop a conducive business climate for local entrepreneurs to thrive within local and global horticulture market”, he said.
According to the minister, the government is assiduously working hand-in-hand with Hortifresh to create a conducive ambience for farmers to produce more fruits and vegetables for commercial purposes other than subsistence. Having said that, he echoed the platitude of how most farmers to be precise the small scale farmers are financially destitute; ergo, produce poorly for commercialization.
Speaking to AgricToday Media in an interview, the Hon. Deputy Minister indicated unequivocally that government has agriculture at heart especially the horticulture industry and for matter government has put forth financial measures to mitigate the financial insecurity of farmers. ”Recently government through Bank of Ghana and MoFA is introducing a scheme (Ghana agriculture insurance scheme) to provide financial aid for small scale farmers” he said. Remarkably, he thanked the program manager of hortifresh, Shailey Assibey-Yeboah for making this year’s exhibition possible.
At the climax of the event, the Netherlands ambassador, H.E Ron Strikker commended the organizers of the fair as well as farmers who are not reluctant in the horticultural industry. According to him this year’s fruit and vegetable fair has had a lot of participants more than ever.
“The Thursday programme, Business Platform Meeting is a wonderful programme for everybody in the fruit and vegetable sector to participate to meet its order and make sure the sector players achieve further professionalization and professional horticultural sector”, he said. Moreover, he disclosed how the initiative has been espoused by the Netherlands government as partners. He did not forget to laud the Dutch government for his paradigm shift initiative.
The program manager of HortiFresh, Sheila Assibey-Yeboah in an interview with AgricToday reverberated that the fair is to support sector players with opportunities to access better market as well as discernibility for their products and services and to alert the general public about the sector’s activities in the country. “We consider this gesture as an avenue to develop a conducive business climate for dynamic entrepreneurs, who are actively taking leaps towards being competitive in the global horticultural space.” she said.
HortiFresh is a programme supported by the Embassy of the Kingdom of Netherlands which has prioritized commercial agriculture in its strategic plan of moving from aid and trade. The programme’s mission is to establish a sustainable and internationally competitive fruit and vegetable sector that contributes to inclusive economic growth, food and nutrition security in Ghana and Ivory Coast.
