Forum strengthens capacity to tackle post-harvest losses in Africa

Post-harvest losses constituent the most critical constraint for food security in sub-Saharan Africa.

It has been a perennial problem facing the Ghanaian food and agriculture economy – inadequate storage facilities, poor road infrastructure and lack of ready market for most agricultural produce are among contributing factors.

Ghana is implementing a national post-harvest strategy under the 2011-2015 Medium-Term Agriculture Sector Investment Plan (METASIP), which intends to reduce post-harvest losses through improved harvesting and post harvest handling practices.

The country however loses 20–50 percent of all vegetables, fruits, cereals, roots and tubers produced each year. This demonstrates the low capacity of African governments and other stakeholders to address and meet the challenge of reducing post harvest losses. 

To strengthen the capacity of stakeholders in the agricultural sector to tackle Post-Harvest Losses (PHL), a forum is taking place in Johannesburg, South Africa, hosted by the African Union Commission (AUC) and the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO).

Komla Prosper Bissi of the AU Commission explains that the conference is taking stock of the implementation roadmap and strategy to achieve targets set in the Malabo Declaration to reduce post-harvest losses.

“This meeting will be able to come out with actions that will contribute to the development of the implementation strategy and roadmap which has been requested by our Heads of States,” he said.

It will also formulate interventions that would need to be undertaken in the short, medium and long term.

Reducing Post-harvest losses is one of seven intervention areas stipulated by African Heads of States in the recent Malabo Declaration to commemorate the 10^th anniversary of the Comprehensive Africa Agricultural Development Programme (CAADP) implementation.

In the Malabo Declaration, the Heads of States resolved to reduce the current level of post harvest losses by half within the next ten years. The commitment is to end hunger on the continent by 2025.

Mr. Bissi, a Senior Advisor on the CAADP, observed that one of the achievements of CAADP is to bring agriculture back to the discussion table as a priority sector as governments make efforts to support the process.

Countries are currently at different levels of implementation but from the African Union perspective there is a high level of commitment amongst governments on the continent.

“We have seen an increase in public sector budget allocation to agriculture. Ghana currently is working closely to achieving the 10percent allocation as well as other countries like Ethiopia and Rwanda,” noted Mr. Bissi.

But there is the need to integrate PHL reduction into national agricultural investment plans in the context of the CAADP, which guides member states of the AU on investments in agriculture. This is already the case in Ghana, Uganda and Tanzania.

The ongoing PHL Conference is designed to fill some of the existing knowledge and policy gaps and promote increased investment in PHL reduction programmes.

Story by Kofi Adu Domfeh 

Listen to audio report...

https://soundcloud.com/kofi-adu-domfeh/reducing-post-harvest-losses-in-ghana-to-re-vitalize-agric-productivity