Ghana’s efforts toward agricultural modernisation and export-driven rural transformation risk deepening inequality and marginalising smallholder farmers, fisherfolk and pastoralists unless stronger protections are implemented, a United Nations Working Group has warned following its first official visit to the country.
The UN experts said Ghana has established a “robust human rights framework” through recent legislation and policy reforms, including the Fisheries and Aquaculture Act 2025, the Social Protection Act 2025 and the Affirmative Action Act, but cautioned that a “persistent gap” remains between policy commitments and implementation on the ground.
According to the Working Group on the rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas, the country’s increasing emphasis on mechanised and export-oriented agriculture could create a “dual food system” in which large-scale commercial agribusiness expands while family-based farming communities face deeper exclusion.
The experts noted that smallholder farmers, artisanal fishers and pastoralists continue to face poverty, limited market access and weak legal protections despite forming what they described as the “backbone of food production” in Ghana.
The UN delegation also identified land tenure insecurity as a major structural challenge, arguing that Ghana’s dual land ownership system leaves many subsistence farmers vulnerable to displacement with limited legal recourse. Women, youth and elderly farmers were said to face “compounded disadvantages” within both statutory and customary systems, particularly regarding land ownership and decision-making rights.
The Working Group further linked Ghana’s rural development challenges to environmental degradation caused by illegal mining activities, describing galamsey as the country’s “most acute” environmental emergency. The experts warned that river pollution, farmland destruction and heavy-metal contamination now extend beyond mining zones and increasingly threaten food security, public health and rural livelihoods.
The report also highlighted the economic vulnerabilities within Ghana’s agricultural value chain, including poor rural road networks, inadequate cold storage infrastructure and the dominance of intermediaries in commodity markets. These conditions, the experts said, contribute to severe post-harvest losses and weaken the earning capacity of rural producers.
Access to finance remains another major constraint, with many smallholder farmers and artisanal fishers unable to secure formal credit because they lack conventional collateral requirements demanded by financial institutions.
The UN delegation additionally raised concerns about the exclusion of pastoralist communities, particularly Fulbe groups, noting that many remain “structurally invisible” within governance systems due to documentation barriers and insecure tenure arrangements. The experts warned that shrinking grazing land, climate pressures and agricultural expansion are intensifying tensions between pastoralists and settled farming communities.
While acknowledging Ghana’s policy progress, the Working Group stressed that meaningful rural transformation would require “political courage” to confront entrenched interests and implement reforms capable of protecting vulnerable rural populations during the country’s agricultural transition.
