The Minister for Food and Agriculture Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto on Wednesday 17th August 2021 performed the swearing in ceremony of the newly constituted five Board of Directors for the Quality Control Company, a subsidiary of COCOBOD at the Ministry of Food and Agriculture conference room.
Speaking at the swearing in ceremony, Dr, Owusu Afriyie Akoto was emphatic of Ghana’s enviable position on the international market for premier quality cocoa, he therefore urged managers of the country’s quality control board not to relent on its efforts to sustain, if not improve the quality of cocoa. In recent years, Cote D’Ivoire’s quality has been going up because of the adoption of the practices that we have here in Ghana” he said.
The Board Chair Dr. Ebenezer Owusu who is a Lecturer & Head of Department of Plant & Environmental Biology, University of Ghana, Legon pledged and resolved to improve the quality standards of Cocoa in Ghana.
He thanked the President of the Republic of Ghana Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo for the opportunity given to them to serve the Country in another capacity.
Dr. Owusu said Communication was a vital component of good governance and Board Members should communicate clearly and timely so as to develop a sense of mutual confidence and trust with their managers. He noted that it was important for the Board to have regular interactions with managers about risk mitigation and prevention.
‘’We do know that the International Cocoa Standards require cocoa of merchantable quality to be well fermented, thoroughly dried, free from smoky beans, free from abnormal or foreign odour and free from any evidence of adulteration. It must reasonably be free from living insects, broken beans and any other foreign materials. The quality of cocoa from Ghana has been used as a standard to measure cocoa from other countries’’ he said.
He said that, all of them were members of the previous board, and for them to be reappointed indicates the confidence the President have in them. He also said that it was during their tenure as Board of Directors that Quality Control Company was granted accreditation by the International Organization for Standardization and the International Electrotechnical Commission, for inspection of Cocoa activities and testing Laboratory for pesticide residue which placed Ghana ahead of other countries. He added that reaching the top was a monumental achievement but remaining there may be the most spectacular feat of all.
He ended by saying that what they do in the coming months would define QCC for years to come and promised their full dedicated effort to strengthen and improve QCC.
The 5-member board includes Julius Mark Kodjo Opoku Martinson, Acting Managing Director of Quality Control, Dr. Barima Afranie a Lecturer at the Department of Pharmacy; University of Ghana; S. B. Kangbere, University of Ghana, Legon and Kwaku Oppong a businessman representing the Licensed Buying Cocoa Companies.
BY BAGBARA TANKO & UROWOLI PHILLIP
PRO UNIT, MoFA