The production of sweetpotato in Ghana is less than 20 percent
of targeted production levels, mainly hindered by perception that the crop is
food for poor people.
But the role of sweetpotato is becoming more important and
substantial in fostering household food and nutrition diversification.
The orange-fleshed sweetpotato varieties, for instance, can
contribute to combating Vitamin A Deficiency and can also serve as wheat flour
substitute in processed products.
Interest groups in food and agriculture want sweetpotato to
be seen as the next crop the country should be projecting, due the potentials
in food security and industrial value addition, as well as its growing export
demand.
“If you link up the future of potato and starch in general
to the car industry, you realize that even an over production can be mopped up
by the vehicle industry, because they can use most of that material to build
the dashboards that you so comfortably want to sit in,” observed Joseph
Faalong, a director at the Ministry of Food and Agriculture.
He however says there is the need to raise the productivity
of potato higher, by creating interest in the business potentials of sweet
potato production, especially among the youth.
“To do potato on a large scale, we need to devise mechanisms
for lifting the crop. If we as researchers can look more into mechanical
harvesters, machinery that can lift the crop on a large scale, then we’ll be
doing a lot of justice to productivity,” he added.
The International Sweetpotato Centre (CIP), in collaboration
with the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) and the
Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), is running a training of
trainers’ course on “Everything You Need to Know About Sweet Potato”.
Project Coordinator, Dr. Ibok Oduro of the KNUST, noted there
are business opportunities along the sweetpotato value chain; from planting to
marketing and processing of the crop.
“Sweet potato gives a variety of avenues for people to
create business and that is why we think the training of trainers will empower
them to be able to do such things,” she said, adding breeders are developing
seed varieties that are resistant to diseases and also looking at machines for
peeling sweet potatoes for industrial attraction.
The Crops Research Institute (CRI) of the CSIR has developed
and released 12 high yielding sweetpotato varieties, which yield 2-3 times
higher than the traditional varieties.
Dr. Oduro is encouraging Ghanaians to particularly look at potato
leaf production as a viable agricultural venture.
“With sweet potato, within four months to five months you
harvest; so it means three times in a year, you have something to sell… the
leaf is very rich in anti-oxidants,” she said.
CIP has been working to promote sweet potato in Ghana,
through partnerships with local institutions on post-harvest handling,
techniques in breeding systems
“Sweet potato was an orphaned crop but now with the training,
we are opening the mind of people on how we can use and harness sweetpotato
like other crops,” said Putri Ernawati Abidin, Project Manager at the
International Potato Centre (CIP).
In Ghana, CIP has set a goal of reaching nearly 500,000
households with resilient nutritious sweetpotato by 2020.
By Kofi Adu Domfeh
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