The 2018 National Best Farmer, Mr James Obeng Boateng has been presented with a GHS480,000 cash by the Agricultural Development Bank (adb).

Presenting the dummy cheque to him at the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) in Accra on Wednesday, 12 June 2019, the Managing Director of adb, Dr John Kofi Mensah said the bank’s decision to be the lead sponsor of the National Farmers Day Awards was conceived in the year 2001 with an initial decision to build a three-bedroom fully-furnished house at a place of choice for the national winner.

“During this journey, we built a total of 15 houses in various locations in the Greater Accra, Ashanti and Brong Ahafo regions just to mention a few. The bank has so far spent about $1.8 million on this noble initiative; it is worthy to note that this amount excludes the sponsorship of the National Farmers Forum and Welcome Cocktail,” he said.

Mr Mensah said the bank is satisfied with the business proposal presented by Mr Boateng on how he will use the funds to improve and expand his business.

In his proposal, Mr Boateng indicated that he will use the money to improve his 1,000-acre farm at Nyinase near Nkoranza Brong Ahafo. He said part of the money will be used to build a two-bedroom farmhouse, buy a tractor, four poly tanks and also construct four mechanised boreholes.

Additionally, he will hire 30 more workers, clear a five-acre land, purchase seeds, feed, medication and also buy tricycles and repair some access roads leading to his farm.

Mr Mensah said adb remains committed in ensuring that the agriculture sector remains a critical part of Ghana’s economic growth.

“In ensuring this, we have expanded our Agricultural Department into an Agricultural Business Division headed by a General Manager.”

He said the Agribusiness Division has been departmentalised into an Agricultural Value Chain and Agricultural Services Department, which captures all the sectors in agriculture.

The Agric Value Chain Department is available to facilitate loans and offer advisory services to customers in the crops, livestock, poultry, marine, cereals, legumes, vegetables, fruits and other export commodities sector, while the Agricultural Services Department is available to also facilitate loans as well as offer advisory services to customers in agro-marketing (veterinary, agro-input distribution, marketing and packaging).

The Value Chain Infrastructure Unit deals with customers who are into haulage, warehousing, mechanisation and other agricultural-related businesses.

Mr Mensah said in the coming months, the bank will hold an Agricultural Business Forum with key stakeholders within the sector to offer further insight into the funding opportunities that exist at adb for farmers.