Ghana’s economy is in crisis - 3

The 2016 presidential candidate of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo says Ghana is in a state of crisis because the agric sector which is the backbone of the economy has collapsed under President Mahama led NDC administration.

The NPP leader who was presenting what he described as “The Real State of the Nation Address” painted a gloomy picture of the current state of Ghana’s agric sector.

According to Nana Addo, “we are in the state of crisis because investments in agriculture have decreased under Mahama. We are now recording negative figures.”

“We are in the state of crisis when Ghana begins to import cocoa from the Cote d’Ivoire as the Minister of Finance informed us that we imported 15,000 metric tonnes of cocoa last year,” he said.

Nana Addo, who expressed shock over the developments, blamed the short fall in cocoa production in the country on what he termed as the politicization of the cocoa mass exercise which NDC administration inherited from Kufuor regime.

“We are in the state of crisis when cocoa production has been going down because government of Ghana changed the mass cocoa spraying regime they met to NDC cocoa farming spraying project and politicized it,” he stated.

Nana Addo noted that the stagnation of the agriculture sector was evidence in the importation of $1.5 billion of food stuffs into the country in 2014 against the food import bill of 600 million cedis in 2008.

He also stated that importation of fish and poultry products as well as cooking oil have all doubled between 2008 and 2015.

In what could be his disappointment with Mahama’s handling of the sector, Nana Addo noted that production of staple foods have been stagnating for years, saying government between 2008 and 2013 spent a colossal 374 million on importation of rice alone.

This according to Nana Addo testifies of the escalating food insecurity in the country.

“We are in a state of crisis when the fishing industry and the coastal economy have collapsed and government officials play politics with premix fuel.”

Nana Addo who also expressed concern over the excessive taxes imposed on Ghanaians and business said it is clear that the Ghanaian economy is in crisis.

Story by: Michael Creg Afful

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