UNDP initiative promotes full-year farming
Solar-powered irrigation pumps provided for farmers at Pashiguni, near Tamalgu in the Karaga District of the Northern Region have led to all-year-round farming in the area.
About 37 farmers, cultivating about 35 acres of land, use the facility to irrigate their vegetable and fruit fields resulting in increased yields.
They have been harvesting their crops three times in a year.
The solar-power irrigation pumps were provided by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in collaboration with the government to assist to improve the livelihoods of farmers in the area through increased production.
The United Nations (UN) in Ghana, led by its Communications Group, has visited some of the farms and other projects supported by the UNDP in the various districts in the region to assess their status.
These included a buffer zone at Tampion to protect the Tampion Dam as well as ensure clean water for the people, a vegetable nursery at Tampion in the Nanton District to support farming activities of women in the area and a seedlings nursery at Libga in the Savelugu Municipality.
Mr Iddrisu Abubakar, a Vegetable and Fruit Farmer, one of the beneficiaries of the solar-power irrigation pumps project at Pashiguni near Tamalgu, told the UN delegation that the project had helped to increase the incomes of farmers.
He added that they could now cater for the education of their children and cater for their other needs.
Vegetables and fruits grown on the fields include cabbage, pepper and banana.
Mr Abubakar said the nutritional status of especially their children had also improved.
Through the intervention, he had built a house and bought a motorbike.The farmers at Pashiguni appealed for the construction of the feeder road linking the farming area to the main town to enable them to transport their farm produce to market centres.
Madam Gurunpa Nashiru, Magazia (Leader) of Women Farmers on the Tampion Vegetable project lauded the intervention, saying, it had been providing both nutrients and income for their families.
Ms Praise Nutakor, Communications Analyst, UNDP, said they excited that the interventions were helping to improve livelihoods of the people and advised members of the communities to take full advantage of them to lift themselves out of poverty.
Madam Cynthia Prah, National Information Officer at UN Information Centre in Accra, said the projects were part of efforts at achieving the Sustainable Development Goals – to ensure that no one was left behind.
Source: GNA