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Bole, Ghana – District Chief Executive for Bole, Veronica Alele Heming, says she is upbeat about the prospects of a booming cashew industry in the coming years.
According to her, the Bole District is largely suitable for the establishment of large acreages of cashew plantations, and urged the youth and women to each try and plant at least two or more acres of cashew.
Speaking to Savannah News, Madam Heming, said under the government’s cashew plantation and export programme, the Bole District Assembly has supplied 80,000 cashew seedlings to over 1000 farmers including women to go into the establishment of cashew plantations.
“The supply of the seedlings is free of charge. The farmers are not paying for it. Once you express interest, we register you and supply you with the seedlings. Even farmers who are far away from the district capital, the Assembly has hired a truck to car the seedlings to them in the various communities.
“Thankfully we have the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research in our district. One of their core businesses is research into cashew development, and so that is why when you go round Bole and its surrounding communities you find a lot of cashew trees”, she noted.
Madam Heming also said it is her hope that through the one district one factory initiative an investor would come and establish a processing factory to process the cashew into different finished products such as butter, oil, juice and other confectionaries.
He stated that, each year the Assembly would increase the supply of cashew seedlings to interested farmers to establish more plantations. This, she believes, would lay the ground for a booming cashew industry in the district in the next five to ten because the industry could by then be able to employ thousands of people.
“Next year we’re planning to supply 100,000 seedlings to the farmers. The following year, we’ll supply 120,000. That is how we’re going to increase the plantations in the district so that the youth and women can have sustainable source of income”, Madam Heming revealed.
By Savannahnewsonline.com/Philip Liebs
