{"id":117286,"date":"2026-02-28T08:48:32","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T08:48:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=117286"},"modified":"2026-02-28T08:48:32","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T08:48:32","slug":"government-too-focused-on-gold-ignoring-agriculture-afenyo-markin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=117286","title":{"rendered":"Government too focused on gold, ignoring agriculture- Afenyo-Markin"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n \t<\/i> Read Time:<\/span>1 Minute, 43 Second <\/div>\n\n <\/div>
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Minority Leader Alexander Afenyo-Markin has criticised the government\u2019s handling of agriculture, arguing that strong public statements are not being matched by concrete action, despite heavy budgetary allocations to the sector.<\/p>\n

Speaking on Newsfile a day after President John Dramani Mahama delivered his 2026 State of the Nation Address, the Effutu MP questioned the government\u2019s priorities and the visibility of the Agriculture Minister.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf government is that serious, there would have been sufficient investment in agriculture \u2014 but they are fixated on the gold board thing, abandoning other areas of the economy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

According to Afenyo-Markin, the administration has devoted much of its attention to the Ghana Gold Board, at the expense of farming, food production and value addition.<\/p>\n

His comments come at a time when the government is defending its investment in the agricultural sector. In the 2026 budget, GH\u00a22.2 billion was allocated to the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, alongside GH\u00a21.7 billion for roads, processing zones and value chains.<\/p>\n

Additional funding includes GH\u00a2245 million for food security and agro-industrial programmes, GH\u00a2828 million for agricultural enclave roads, and GH\u00a2690 million for Farmer Service Centres.<\/p>\n

Despite these figures, the Minority Leader insisted that farmers and agribusinesses have yet to feel the impact of the spending on the ground.<\/p>\n

He also renewed his criticism of the cancellation of the One District One Factory (1D1F) initiative, which was introduced to promote decentralised industrialisation and job creation.<\/p>\n

In July 2025, Trade Minister Elizabeth Ofosu-Adjare told Parliament that the 1D1F programme had been scrapped, with the government shifting focus to agro-processing parks under the 24-hour economy policy.<\/p>\n

However, Afenyo-Markin argued that more than a year later, no clear alternative framework has been presented.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Trade Minister is yet to outline a concrete replacement strategy,\u201d he said, calling on the government to explain what incentives are being offered to attract private sector investment.<\/p>\n

He noted that without a well-defined industrial policy, efforts to link agriculture to manufacturing and job creation could be undermined.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Minority Leader Alexander Afenyo-Markin has criticised the government\u2019s handling of agriculture, arguing that strong public statements are not being matched by concrete action, despite heavy budgetary allocations to the sector.<\/p>\n

Speaking on Newsfile a day after President John Dramani Mahama delivered his 2026 State of the Nation Address, the Effutu MP questioned the government\u2019s priorities and the visibility of the Agriculture Minister.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_2277560469115098_106292521332774":"","twitter_aToxNzczMzI3Njk4OTg4ODUxMjAxOw==_1773327698988851200":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[428,163,2160,1883,10,9,17244],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-117286","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-afenyo-markin","category-agriculture","category-gold","category-national","category-politics","category-popular","category-sona"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117286","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=117286"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117286\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=117286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=117286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=117286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}