The Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto, has rubbished off reports that the country is currently facing food shortages.

He said the Ghanaians should disregard such reports because there is an abundance of food in the country.

Addressing the staff of MOFA and farmers in the Eastern Region as part of his official tour, Dr. Akoto said linking high food prices with shortage is non-existent.

“There is no food shortage in Ghana as is being speculated, the food situation in the regions is enough evidence, however, we recognise that food is relatively expensive due to external factors.”

The Minister said, the increase in prices of food commodities is not because of the government’s policies, but external factors such as the increment of imported chemicals and other external factors beyond their control.

“We are encouraging farmers to switch to organic fertilizers produced locally to reduce the impact of fertilizer shortage on food production and urged the far west to switch quickly to the use of compost.”

On financing from the banks, Dr Afriyie Akoto hinted that the government is looking at alternatives to compel banks to lend a portion of their loans to farmers to improve production.

That, he said is to address farmers’ inability to acquire loans from the banks adding that several efforts to the banks had proved futile over the years and the banks preferred to give loans to business people than farmers.

Inflation in Ghana recently moved to a record 27.6% in May, data from the Ghana Statistical Service showed.

Compared to the 23.6 percent recorded in April, this represents a four percentage points jump in the inflation rate.

The latest development means that in the month of May 2022, the general price level was 27.6% higher than in May 2021.

Month-on-month inflation between April 2022 and May 2022 was 4.1%

The Consumer Price Index for May 2022 was 162.8 relative to 127.6 in May 2021.

Also, food inflation rose again to a record 30.1 percent compared to 26.6 percent recorded in April while Non-food inflation stood at 25.7 percent in May, compared to 21.3 percent recorded in the previous month.

The inflation for imported goods was 28.2%, which is higher than the 24.7% recorded for April 2022, while the inflation for locally produced items was 27.3%, up from the 23.0% recorded in April 2022.

Source: www.pulse.com.gh