Data from the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) shows that Burkina Faso is Ghana’s top export destination for its foods in the West Africa region.

From 2015 to 2019, Ghana has seen an increase in food export with a corresponding revenue of GH¢868.13 million.

MoFA has credited the agricultural flagship programme, Planting for Food and Jobs for the rise in food export to neighbourimg countries.

Burkina Faso topped in the importation of varied foodstuff such as rice, pawpaw, palm fruit, sorghum, cowpea, gari, banana, groundnuts, yellow and white maize, amounting to 92,319.40 tonnes.

Cote d’Ivoire came second for mainly importing yam, maize, cowpea, citrus and onions of 14,222.25 tonnes

Mali is the least on the table as it recorded export volume of 1,180.40 tonnes.

In all, foodstuff with a volume of 563,859.33 tonnes, were exported to Togo, Cote d’Ivoire, Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Benin and Northern Nigeria over the period.

They included banana, cabbage/green pepper, citrus/orange, cowpea, gari, ginger, groundnuts, palm fruits, palm oil and pawpaw.

Others were plantain, rice, sorghum, soya beans, white maize, yam and yellow maize.

Volume of exports

Daily Graphic reports that Ghana realised GH¢84.07 million in 2015 for foodstuffs to neighbouring countries, shooting up to GH¢124.1 million in 2016, GH¢206 million in 2017 and GH¢265.58 million in 2018. However, the figure dipped in 2019 to GH¢188.36 million because prices of foodstuffs saw a significant drop that year as a result of glut.

In terms of volumes, in 2015 the grand total of foodstuffs exported amounted to 61,463.57 tonnes, while in 2016 the export volumes went up to 85,015.68 tonnes.

In 2017 and 2018, the figures shot up to 130,937.70 tonnes and 153,582.07 tonnes, respectively, while in 2019 the figure dropped to 133,508.30 tonnes.