Mr Eric Opoku, Minister of Food and Agriculture, has assured farmers and contractors working on the Kpong Irrigation Scheme that government is taking steps to ensure the prompt resumption of suspended rehabilitation and modernisation works on the project.
The Minister gave the assurance on Thursday during a working visit to the project sites at Asutsuare in the Greater Accra Region, where he interacted with stakeholders and assessed the progress of work and challenges confronting the project.
Mr Opoku said he had received several payment certificates from contractors and had forwarded them to the Ministry of Finance for urgent action to enable work to resume.
“I have received about four certificates requesting payment and I have submitted them to the Ministry of Finance for immediate attention. Within the shortest possible time, payments will be effected and work will resume on site,” he said.
The Kpong Irrigation Scheme Rehabilitation and Modernisation Project, being implemented under the World Bank-funded Food System Resilience Project (FSRP), covers a total area of 4,040 hectares.
The 22.5 million US dollar project, which began in November 2024, is about 75 percent complete but has been suspended due to financial constraints.
Mr Opoku noted that irrigation development remained a key pillar of government’s Agriculture for Economic Transformation agenda and the Feed Ghana Programme, which seeks to shift the country from rain-fed farming to year-round agricultural production.
“Kpong is the largest irrigation infrastructure in Ghana, and this is where attention must be focused,” he said, adding that government would ensure the project was completed within schedule.
The Minister also announced the approval of Farmer Service Centres for both the Left and Right Banks of the Kpong Scheme to enhance farmers’ access to mechanisation services, inputs, training and modern technologies, including precision agriculture tools.
Briefing the Minister, Mr Kofi Modzaka, Technical Supervising Consultant for the FSRP under the Ghana Irrigation Development Authority (GIDA), said the current phase of the project was a continuation of works initiated under the Ghana Commercial Agriculture Project (GCAP), which was completed in 2021.
He explained that the rehabilitation works included the conversion of open canals into closed pipe systems, canal lining, road rehabilitation, drainage works, and the installation of automation and instrumentation systems.
Mr Modzaka said about 62 kilometres of open channels had been converted into closed pipe systems, representing 96 per cent completion, while rehabilitation of major access routes stood at about 65 percent.
Automation and instrumentation works were about 30 per cent complete, with some equipment yet to be imported into the country, he added.
“Overall, the project is about 75 percent complete, with 25 percent of the work remaining,” Mr Modzaka said, noting that the fully rehabilitated scheme would improve water-use efficiency, boost agricultural output, raise farmers’ incomes and reduce conflicts over water use.
On behalf of farmers, Mr Charles Tetteh Hombey, President of the Kpong Irrigation Scheme Water Users Association, welcomed the Minister’s visit but raised concerns about difficulties in marketing rice produced under the scheme.
“We produce, but we cannot sell. That is our major problem,” he said, appealing for the deployment of aggregators and off-takers to purchase farmers’ rice, especially as some farmers had defaulted on loans due to unsold produce.
He also expressed concern about the suspension of works, cautioning that prolonged delays could negatively affect livelihoods in the area.
Responding, Mr Opoku said government, through the National Food Buffer Stock Company, was working with millers and aggregators to address the marketing challenges and absorb excess rice production to sustain farmer confidence.
The Minister reaffirmed government’s commitment to supporting farmers, stressing that functional irrigation systems were essential to national food security, particularly in the face of climate variability.
