Offinso (Ash), April 25, GNA - The Offinso District Assembly has embarked on a project under which over 500,000 cocoa, oil palm and citrus seedlings have been nursed for distribution to interested farmers to help rehabilitate their farms.

The project is under the initiative of Mr Collins Augustine Ntim, the District Chief Executive, Dr Kofi Konadu Apraku, Minister of Regional Integration and NEPAD and Member of Parliament (MP) for Offinso North and Mr Kwabena Sarfo, MP for Offinso South.

Mr Ntim, who disclosed this at the launch of the project at Offinso at the weekend, said the project is aimed at reducing poverty, youth unemployment and improve income of farmers.

The project estimated at the cost of 350 million cedis also envisages the establishment of an oil palm processing mills to be known as Offinso Oil Mills to provide ready market for farmers and also serve as employment opportunities to the teeming youth in the area. Mr Ntim said under the project over 3,000 youth in the area were supposed to be employed to cater for the various processes such as cutting of polythene bags into required sizes, filling the bags with sand and watering of the seedlings.

The DCE said that plans were far advanced to employ additional 340 young men and women to be trained as agricultural extension agents to help give technical advice to farmers to improve productivity. He also said beneficiary farmers would start payment for the seedlings after a period of five years, when they have started harvesting.

Mr Ntim noted that some of the challenges confronting the project included the delay in the release of poverty alleviation segment of the common fund, which was the main source of funding for the project, as well as the difficulty in getting the required number of hi-tech oil palm nuts and citrus seeds.

He appealed to farmers in the district to take advantage of the opportunity of the project and rehabilitate their farms to help improve their incomes.