Deputy Minister of Food and Agriculture, Dr Sagri Bambangi, has revealed that government would initiate punitive measures by blacklisting farmers who fail to repay credit advanced to them under the Planting for Food and Jobs Programme (PFFJP).

The Deputy Minister issued a stern warning when the Ministry of Food and Agriculture appeared before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) Parliament to answer questions relating to the Auditor General’s report for 2015.

He was asked what the ministry was doing to recoup credit given to beneficiaries of government's inputs loaned to farmers under the subsidy programme.

According to Dr Bambangi, there was an arrangement with small holder farmers to pay up loans that were given them and that the ministry has streamlined its policy on loans to eliminate cases of bad loans

“We insisted that after the government subsidy even though the price of a tractor was still as high as GH?80,000 farmers were required to pay cash and carry, and I think the lowest cost tractor was about GH?70,000 and yet the poor farmer was required to pay just because we do not have that trust.

And with our Planting for Food and Jobs programme, even though we knew we were dealing with small scale farmers, we still had to insist that half of the input cost should be paid upfront before taking delivery of the inputs.

We are hoping that the farmers would live up to expectation; but, we want to impress upon the farmers that we are going to take very punitive measures against those who will deliberately refuse to pay for our credit and also try to track them. That is why we have tried to embark on biometric registration of farmers, to track and blacklist anyone who deliberately default in payment of our credit,” he told members of PAC.

The government, under the PFFJ programme, has distributed subsidised fertilisers to farmers to be paid on instalment basis.

Recipients of the fertiliser are expected to pay 50 percent of the subsidised price, which would be reimbursed after harvesting their produce.

However, the 2015 Auditor General's report has indicated similar loan schemes managed in the past generated negative consequences.

The Planting for Food and Jobs initiative is expected to give incentives to prisons, colleges, universities and schools to setup farms while encouraging Ghanaians, both urban and rural, to take up farming as either a full or part-time activity.

In July this year, Food and Agriculture Minister, Dr Akoto Owusu Afriyie, told Parliament that government has so far expended GH¢157million on the ‘Planting for Food and Jobs’ campaign for the major season in the southern sector and the three Northern Regions.

He also added that inputs distribution for the minor cropping season in the southern sector was on-going.

Although agriculture makes up a significant portion of Ghana’s economy, the 2016 Oxford Business Group report states that the country still imports a number of staples in order to meet domestic demand.

“In 2014, Ghana imported more than US$1.6bn worth of agricultural products including US$329m of rice, US$155m of poultry meat and US$123m of wheat,” the report stated.