Brand the local rice - Lecturer

Accra Sept. 19, GNA - Dr. Samuel Asuming Brempong, a lecturer at the University of Ghana on Saturday urged the Ministry of Food and Agriculture to come up with a brand name for the locally produced rice to make it more viable on the market. He said most people would want to buy the local rice but when they go to the market and say they want to buy local rice they are given any local rice available even though there are differences in them.

Dr Asuming Brempong was speaking on the Topic: "Food security" at a one-day seminar to educate the media on the topic. He said, " The local rice are of different variety but no one identifies them. When you want to buy the imported rice you have a choice, you either want "Chicago stars, or American rice, but local rice is local rice".

Calling on the government to help the country market its local rice to the extent of even exporting excess, he said there are imported rice in every corner of the country, but one has to go the Ministry of Agriculture special selling centres to get the local rice. He said the government should create an enabling environment that could promote a good distribution system so that the market could be flooded with the local rice.

"If the local rice is available on the market, a lot of people will buy the local rice and leave the imported rice for patriotic reasons, or they may want to taste it". Even though Dr Asuming commended the sector Ministry for the effort made in promoting local rice, he said there should be more adverts on the local rice. He noted that when people are informed about the rice, they would patronise it, adding, "at the moment people do not know much, we can do better".