Over 5,000 smallholder cocoa farmers in the country have benefitted from the ‘GIZ-Sustainable Management Service (SMS) COVID-19 Response Project’.
Addressing a closing ceremony to signal the end of the ‘GIZ-SMS COVID-19 Response Project’ in Kumasi, Mr. Francis Ahiamatah, the Programmes Manager for Sustainable Management Service, said the initiative was implemented in five regions, 15 districts, and 208 communities across the country. The regions are Ashanti, Eastern, Central, Bono, and Western-North. The farmers received items ranging from nose masks, hand sanitizers, hand washing facilities, soap, Wellington boots, and gloves.
Mr. Francis Ahiamatah, the Programmes Manager for Sustainable Management Service (SMS), a subsidiary of ECOM Agrotrade Limited, said the Project sought to mitigate immediate health and economic impacts on cocoa smallholder farmers, adding that it was also to encourage increased adoption of COVID-19 health protocols and safety measures that reduce the risk of spreading the virus in rural communities.
Health information delivered through remote channels to farmers
Mr. Ahiamatah said the one-year project was implemented by providing farmers with timely and relevant health and financial information.
The information was delivered through remote channels including radio and interactive voice response (IVR), videos, and community information centers.
The German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ) funded the project with technical support from the Ghana Health Service (GHS). It deployed an awareness-raising campaign that would improve the application of protective measures against COVID-19 among target farmers in Ghana.
Mr. Ahiamatah said the Biometric Identification System for Access (BISA), a project partner, records the IVR messages directly to the farmers. Service delivery was done through a network of field staff and supervisors, who worked directly with the farmers and community members.
Voices of Beneficiaries of project
Mr. Paul Armah, a farmer and beneficiary of the project, explained that the farmers were frightened to get vaccinated due to the rumours associated with the vaccines, but were relieved after a series of engagements.
He thanked all the partners for helping the farmers know the value of their health and well-being.
Ghana still recovering from COVID-19 shocks
A recent report disclosed that the COVID-19 pandemic has severely hit household incomes in Ghana. Evidence from the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) suggests that 77.4% of households (approximately 22 million people) in Ghana experienced declines in income since the COVID-19 restrictions were introduced in March 2020.
Given high levels of income poverty in Ghana, especially among rural populations dependent on agriculture, these declines in household incomes further deepened the prevailing precarious living conditions of poor rural farm households.
Many public health experts agree that COVID-19 has also surfaced deep-rooted systemic problems in Ghana’s rural healthcare system. At the same time, the lockdown in Ghana due to COVID-19 was not as stringent or lengthy as in other countries (at least until June 2021); it severely affected rural household incomes, including remittances. Almost three-quarters of households surveyed reported income loss due to the pandemic in August 2020.
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