The Soya Value Chain Association of Ghana (SVCAG) is calling on the Chief of Staff and the Minister of Food and Agriculture to engage with Parliament to promulgate laws to protect the value chain and Ghana as a whole, against the commercialisation of GMO soybeans in Ghana. According to the association, the commercial cultivation of GMO soybean seeds would lead to loss of Ghana’s non-GMO soybean niche market, collapse the domestic market driven by con­sumer’s preference for non-GMO soybean, and push smallholder farmers out of business. This was disclosed by the chair­man of the SVCAG, Thomas W. Bello, at a press briefing. Their call followed a publication by the US Department of Agriculture on the Global Agriculture Information Network with the heading, “Ghana Nation­al Biosafety Authority (NBA)”, on March 20, 2024, urging the government to commercialise GMO soybean seeds. Ghanaian Times

 

 

The National President of the Peasant Farmers Association of Ghana, Wepia Addo Awal Adugwala, has reminded policy makers that the problems bedevilling Ghana’s agricultural sector will not be solved by GMOs. Awal Adugwala identified irrigation, agriculture mechanisation, bad roads, and access to markets as some of the pressing issues militating against agriculture and food security. He said the presence of GMOs in Ghana would not solve food security, saying, “already a lot of farmers in Northern Ghana and the middle belt produce a lot of food but have no ready market, storage system, bad roads among other challenges”. Accessagric

 

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