This amount represents almost 50% price cut for beneficiary farmers in both organic and inorganic fertilizers.
The Minister of Food and Agriculture, Hon. Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto, who announced this at a press conference last Friday to officially launch the programme, said the huge subsidy demonstrates NPP government’s commitment towards its campaign promise to revamp agriculture and improve the lives of farmers.
He explained that this package is different from the one to be rolled out under the Planting for Food and Jobs, which will also involve the distribution of 150,00 metric tonnes of fertilizers to about 200,000 selected farmers under the program set to be launched on April 19 at Goaso in the Brong Ahafo Region.
In all, a total of 180,000 metric tonnes of fertilizers, including NPK, Urea and a sizeable quantities of inorganic fertilizers will be distributed to farmers across the country.
This will represent about 3.6million bags of the product expected to cost government a total of GH 207m Ghana cedis.
BREAKDOWN OF SUBSIDY
This year’s subsidy represents a significant increase of about 50% compared to prices offered to farmers last year.
For example, in 2016, farmers paid GH 85.00 and GH 80.00 per 50kgs of Compound Fertilizer (NPK) and Urea respectively.
These amounts have however been slashed significantly to GH 57.50 and GH 47.50 cedis respectively whilst that of organic(ACARP) remains unchanged at GH 15.00.
In all, 13 companies were awarded contracts for the supply of the products under the Public Procurement Act which requires Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) to engage in open tendering selection processes.
The companies include Yara Ghana Limited, Chemico Limited, Afcot Ghana Limited, AMG, Omni Energy Ghana Ltd, Louis Dreyfus Commodities, Iddisal Company Ltd, ETC Ghana Ltd and Centroid Supplies and Logistics Ltd.
The rest are RMG Ghana Ltd, Ganorma Agro-Chemicals, Yayra Glover Organic Inputs Ltd and Accra Compost and Recycling Plants(ACARP).
ASSURANCE
According to the Minister of Food and Agriculture, government has put in the necessary measures at ensuring that farmers have access to the products on time so that they can utilize them to increase productivity.