Show us which Chinese market sold cassava to Ghana – Minister asks

A Deputy Minister of Food and Agriculture in Charge of Crops, Mr Yaw Frimpong Addo, has called on Ghanaians to disregard the propaganda peddled by the main opposition National Democratic Congress’ Member of Parliament for the Asunafo South Constituency in the Ahafo Region, Mr Eric Opoku, that Ghana imports huge tonnes of cassava from China to augment the country’s food stock.

The Deputy Minister has dared the NDC MP to direct Ghanaians to the Chinese market from where Ghana imports cassava.

“Mr Opoku should be willing to show us the very markets he and his NDC members saw the Chinese cassava being sold,” Mr Addo said.

The Deputy Minister, who is also the governing New Patriotic Party’s MP for the Manso Adubia Constituency in the Ashanti Region, said this on Accra100.5FM’s morning show Ghana Yensom hosted by Kwame Obeng Sarkodie on Monday, March 28, 2022.

He warned that as a ministry, “We will not sit down for some of this propaganda about the successes of the Planting for Food and Jobs to go unchecked”.

He stressed that the PF&J programme has enrolled over 1.5 million farmers, a testament to how beneficial it has been for farmers in Ghana.

Mr Addo noted that with the introduction of the Planting for Food and Jobs progarmmes, farmers have been supplied with improved yields to multiply their yields.

He admitted that there have been instances where industrial starch had been imported from China for industrial use and not for consumption.

Mr Addo added that there is no scarcity of cassava in the country.

On the contrary, he said the introduction of the Planting for Food and Jobs programmes has increased yield, leading to the export of some farm products to countries like Burkina Faso, Togo, Ivory Coast “just like the way “we also import from them.”