A planned irrigation project for the people of Agorve in the Ketu
North District of the Volta region meant to improve rice production in the area
may not see the light of day as residents are rejecting the project.
A team of surveyors sent to conduct a visibility study on the
Kpli Irrigation Project were chased out the land by the youth of the
community.
The residents claimed authorities failed to consult them before embarking on the project and that the project would not benefit them. In an interview with citinews, the residents who said they are predominately sugarcane farmers explained that building a rice irrigation project would kick them out of business. Another concern according to one the youth leaders Amegatse Godwin is that that their children might be preoccupied by activities on the rice farms to the detriment of their education as seen in other rice farming communities.
The residents claimed authorities failed to consult them before embarking on the project and that the project would not benefit them. In an interview with citinews, the residents who said they are predominately sugarcane farmers explained that building a rice irrigation project would kick them out of business. Another concern according to one the youth leaders Amegatse Godwin is that that their children might be preoccupied by activities on the rice farms to the detriment of their education as seen in other rice farming communities.
‘’If this project comes here, it would collapse our business
so we don’t want it. Now talking about education, our children would be used to
scare away birds on the rice farms which we also don’t want. If government
wants to help us then he should rather set up a sugarcane factory in the area’’
The government of Ghana through Export Development and
Agriculture Investment Fund (EDAIF) has allocated a fund of over Six Hundred
and Forty-Nine Thousand Ghana Cedis (GHS 649000) for the exercise. The project
when executed will supply constant water to farms in Weta and Afife Traditional
Areas.
The ketu north District Chief Executive, Kofi Lawson however
bemoaned the agitations by the residents. He said the land mass is a marshy
area suitable for tilling of sugarcane, rice and the likes and that, the
project would go a long way to provide farmers the opportunity to exploit other
crops that flourishes in such soil types.
He discounted claims by the residents that they had not been
consulted.
He therefore appealed to the residents to reconsider their
stance and the embrace the project to improve mechanized farming in the area.
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