Vice President of the Confederacy for the Development of Poultry in Africa (CADA), Mr. John Bewuah Edusei has called for a ‘pragmatic program’ to grow the poultry business in Ghana and reduce frozen chicken imports.
He said there is the need for a full and quick attention to be given to the frozen chicken business if government really wants to stabilize the economy of the country.
According to the CADA Vice President, the amount of foreign currency used for these imports is quite huge and has the ability to impact negatively on Ghana’s currency, the Cedi.
“Our youth need jobs and a lot of agricultural schools and Universities have turned out so many agriculturalists onto the field. Persistently allowing the growth of this frozen Chicken importation simply means that we are promoting the businesses of other countries from where these frozen chickens are imported.
Mr. Bewuah Edusei who has been one great voice always advocating for governmental assistance for the poultry industry in Ghana in an interview, pointed out that import values are around a minimum 350,000 metric tons, implying that Ghana eats about 1,000,000 KG of chicken every single day.
Mr. Bewuah Edusei who is also the Secretary to the Hatcheries Association questioned government’s plan to select what it calls Anchor Farmers to grow broilers locally.
“In the 2024 Budget, read a few days ago, the Finance Minister mentioned that there was going to be a selection of Anchor Farmers to grow Broilers locally. The question is, on which market are these going to be sold, when so much of cheap, but poor quality, frozen Chicken have already flooded our markets. In a situation where the market is already choked, when we say we are going to grow more, without cutting down on what comes in, forecasting for a possible market, where are we going to sell these local Broilers,” he queried worriedly.
Listing the stages through which the broiler business should pass in order to become a success, he therefore insisted that his proposal of a 10 percent cut of frozen chicken imports will be very helpful if government is serious about local broiler production.
“Joblessness and poverty are dangerous phenomena to our country. We have to work at it by encouraging our rich, frozen chicken importers to invest in local broiler poultry production, to produce to fill in the 10 percent cut off with local broiler production” he insisted.
