The Member of Parliament (MP) for Twifo Atti Morkwa Constituency, Abraham Odoom has advised cocoa farmers in the country to embrace cocoa production as a business and should not fall foul to the propaganda of free fertilizer.
Speaking in an interview with Spice Fm in Takoradi, he said even though the government has a responsibility to support cocoa farmers, the support is to cushion farmers to a certain point where they can now provide their own inputs, hence the hullabaloo about fertilizers going bad or not coming should not be entertained.
He alleged that there are some cocoa farmers who receive free fertilizers from the government and resell them against the purpose for which they were given and for that matter the issue of getting free fertilizer from the government should be discouraged if farmers want to make it big in their production.
He said, the farmers should see farming as a business and recognise that every business has what he termed as factors of production which fertilizer is one in the cocoa production and therefore if they are able to strike the right equilibrium then the farmer should be able to buy his own fertilizer to do his own production.
Mr Odoom noted that by this effort, the farmers would be making twenty-five (25) to thirty (30) per cent margins on their cocoa production and recounted applying a similar method with one of the cocoa farmers in his constituency who eventually became one of the best cocoa farmers for the district.
He recounted a situation where cocoa farmers in the past could build mansions and undertake so many projects but the situation has changed now because farmers have largely depended on the government for free fertilizers and called on the cocoa farmers to make amends for large production.
“If cocoa farmers would adhere to hand pollination, fertilization and pruning then the cocoa farmer who is making a minimum of even one tonne per hectare /acre should be able to pay for his own fertilizer so as to make profit”, he emphasized.
He noted that the cocoa farmers in the Western North Region are suffering from the swollen shoot disease and therefore the government has gone for money to replant those lands and the COCOBOD is also doing so much that farmers will get some subsistence allowance in addition to sustain them through the planting and harvesting period.
Story: Seth Ameyaw Danquah
