Member of Parliament for Tano North, Dr. Gideon Boako, has urged cocoa farmers within his constituency to refuse offers to sell or lease their agricultural lands to illegal miners, regardless of the economic pressures facing the sector.
Dr. Boako advised farmers to turn down immediate financial offers from galamsey operatives and instead safeguard their plantations to ensure sustainable livelihoods for upcoming generations.
He issued the call at Duayaw Nkwanta in the Bono Region during the distribution of 84 motorized spraying machines to local cocoa farming cooperatives.
Tano North stands as a vital cocoa-producing hub in the Bono Region, housing 8,640 farmers across 84 cooperatives, though a persistent shortage of basic farming implements, particularly spraying equipment, continues to hamper their operations.
The lawmaker disclosed that the Municipal Agriculture Directorate needs approximately 370 spraying machines to conduct effective mass spraying across the municipality, whereas official state supplies have managed to provide only 39.
“After series of meetings with the farmers, they made it clear to me that it will be their greatest pleasure if I’m able to support them in the supply of these machines and so I used part of my common fund to procure 84 of the mistblower spraying machines for the cocoa farmers,” Dr. Boako explained.
Addressing the threat posed by illicit mining, the MP decried the severe destruction inflicted on local lands and water sources across several communities, observing that some growers have already surrendered their properties to galamsey operators.
“The menace of galamsey is real. Unfortunately when it started in the Tano North constituency and some of us complained about it, government appointees in the municipality, the MCE and all of that had press conferences denying it.
Today the reality has dawned on all of us. You go through areas and it’s a complete eyesore, the level of devastation to our lands and water bodies and some cocoa farmers even giving their cocoa farms to galamsey to mine the land because of the little resources they get,” he said.
“We can only admonish them, we can only appeal to them that they should let the cocoa farms remain cocoa farms. They should never attempt to sell their cocoa farms to people who are into galamsey,” he cautioned.
By: Rainbowradioonline.com/Ghana