MCA projects to enhance agriculture

Pg 44 Feb. 11/08
Story Rebecca Quaicoe Duho

PROJECTS in the agricultural sector totalling $106m are expected to be contracted out under the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) programme in Ghana by the middle of the year.
Areas to benefit include transportation to open up the agricultural sector, the provision of credit facilities for farmers and infrastructure such as the building of silos to prevent post-harvest losses.
This was made known in Accra on Tuesday by Mr Martin Eson-Benjamin, the Chief Executive Officer of the Millennium Development Authority (MiDA), the implementing organ of the MCA programme in Ghana, at the first anniversary of the programme.
At the end of the five-year period, the programme, which started its operations in the country from February 16, 2007 with finance from the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) of the USA, is expected to inject $547m into the country.
The amount will be committed to reducing poverty by raising farmer incomes through private sector-led agribusiness development in some of the poorest regions of the country, as well as enhance the competitiveness of Ghana’s agricultural produce in regional and international markets.
According to Mr Eson-Benjamin, who was assisted by Mr Matthew Eric Armah, the Chief Operating Officer of MiDA, last year Ghana committed $45m into the agricultural sector and that as of the end of the third quarter of the year, a total of $20.1m had been received from the MCA.
He said at the end of the five-year programme, 31 old and new districts in northern and southern Ghana and the Affram Basin would have benefited from 950 kilometres and 230 kilometres of feeder and tarred roads, respectively.
He said the government had put in place a strong monitoring and evaluation (M&E) team to ensure that the programme, which was being implemented in three areas — agriculture, transportation and rural services projects — was free from any external and internal shocks.
He gave the assurance that the country was on course to fulfil its requirement under the programme and qualify for a second compact of the programme.
The Resident Country Director of the MCC, Mr Jim Bednar, at a roundtable to brief the media on the background of the MCC, said so far 16 countries, including Ghana, had benefited under the programme, while nine others, including Burkina Faso, Namibia and Senegal, were yet to be added to it.
He said since its creation in 2004, the MCC had approved nearly $5.9 billion in compact and threshold assistance to poor countries across the world.
Mr Bednar said before a country could become eligible to receive assistance, the MCC examined its performance on 17 independent and transparent policy indicators, such as investing in education, control of corruption and natural resource management, and said the programme was using independent indicators to ensure that it provided a fair grounding for all eligible countries.