AICCRA strengthens partnership with Ghana’s Ministry of Food and Agriculture in visit with Hon. Bryan Acheampong
Building robust food systems requires partnerships that enhance farmers' access to climate-smart solutions. In Ghana, the Accelerating Impacts of CGIAR Climate Research for Africa (AICCRA) cooperates with government and public agencies to strengthen national and local infrastructure against climate change.
A delegation from AICCRA Ghana paid a courtesy call on the new Minister of Food and Agriculture (MoFA), the Honorable Bryan Acheampong, on 15 August 2024 to formally introduce the project to the Minister and explore avenues to expand collaborations with the ministry.
The delegation was led by Dr Ghislain Tepa-Yotto, AICCRA Ghana Cluster Leader and Dr Richard Asare, the Country Representative of the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA).
Commending the ministry for its support for the AICCRA project, Dr Tepa-Yotto highlighted established collaborations, such as that with MoFAs Directorate of Agricultural Extension Services (DAES) to integrate the Ghana Meteorological Agency (GMet) and other providers of climate information services into the Research Extension Linkage Committee (RELC), is in line with the roadmap for operationalizing the Ghana National Framework for Climate Services (NFCS).
Other examples include the support to the Plant Production and Regulatory Services Directorate (PPRSD) in developing an Early Warning and Rapid Response System for Pests and Diseases (EWRRS-PD) in Ghana.
Dr Tepa Yotto noted other critical areas for collaboration, such as the integration of the Ag-Innovation Data Hub (AIDH), a digital data sharing platform supported by AICCRA, into the Ghana Agriculture and Agribusiness Platform (GhAAP), and the operationalization of a public sector-led Early Warning and Rapid Response System for Pests and Diseases (EWRRS-PD).
Dr Tepa-Yotto highlighted overlaps between the interests of the Food System Resilience Project (FSRP) in Ghana and AICCRA, and the need to build greater synergies between the two projects and other World Bank–supported initiatives in Ghana.
“We envision a cooperation that prevents the duplication of efforts and enables us to consolidate our resources to help farmers,” Dr Tepa-Yotto said.
Welcoming the delegation from AICCRA Ghana, the Honorable Bryan Acheampong emphasized the ministry’s readiness to work with AICCRA in areas of mutual interest.
“The GhAPP is an important platform for us. It has more than 57,000 registered farmers as well as aggregators and input dealers. Integrating the data hub (Ag-Innovation Data Hub) into the GhAAP should not be a problem. We will have our technical team see what it is about and how we can connect the two platforms.”
Honorable Bryan Acheampong, Minister for Food and Agriculture, Ghana
The courtesy call follows meetings held earlier between AICCRA and MoFA directors, with the ministry confirming the nomination of Ms Prospera Anku to the steering committee of AICCRA Ghana, along with Mr Francis Korankye as the technical focal person for the integration of AIDH and GhAAP. Now with membership of AICCRA Ghana’s steering committee, MoFA will help define the project’s priorities and ensure successful outcomes across all areas of collaboration.
AICCRA partnerships in Ghana are bolstering food security and the livelihoods of farmers across the country in a changing climate through the collaborative scaling of innovations led by CGIAR, a global research partnership for a food-secure future dedicated to transforming food, land, and water systems in a climate crisis.
In 2023, AICCRA’s work with governmental agencies, such as the Crops Research Institute (CRI) of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and GMet helped more than 390,000 farmers access and use climate information services and climate-smart agriculture technologies, and also catalysed significant private sector involvement in the scaling of climate-smart innovations.
Authors
Reginald Ofori Kyere, Communications Officer, AICCRA (International Institute of Tropical Agriculture)
Ghislain Tepa-Yotto, Ghana Cluster Leader, AICCRA (International Institute of Tropical Agriculture)
