Business News of Friday, 16 August 2019

Source: www.ghanaweb.com

Stop importation of fertilizers – Bawumia tells Cocobod, Agric Ministry

Vice President of Ghana,  Dr Mahamudu Bawumia Vice President of Ghana, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia

Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia has charged the Ministry of Agric and Cocobod, the two-state agencies largely responsible for the importation of huge portions of the 600,000 metric tonnes of fertilizers Ghana needs annually, to stop all forms of external sourcing for fertilizer with the coming on board of the new fertilizer processing company located at Asuboi in the Eastern Region.

Addressing a ceremony before the formal commissioning of the Glofert Fertilizer Factory under government’s flagship programme of One District, One Factory (1D1F) at Asuboi in the Eastern Region, Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia indicated that Glofert Limited is the largest fertilizer blending plant in the country with its capacity of 800,000 metric tonnes annually.

“Ghana’s demand for fertilizer is around 600,000 metric tonnes annually. This factory can meet all of Ghana’s demands for fertilizer and so today I want to challenge the Ministry of Food & Agriculture and Cocobod that with the coming on stream of Glofert, we know that the fertilizer blinding plants in Ghana can meet our total demand and still have excess capacity. We therefore don’t really have any reason to be furthermore importing more and more fertilizer and wasting our foreign exchange in doing so,” the Vice President said.

He further challenged the two-state institutions to source for fertilizers domestically as long as the demand could be met locally.

Glofert is a wholly-owned Ghanaian company focusing on improving crop production and ensuring food security through excellent yields by providing environmentally friendly affordable and quality fertilizers to farmers in Ghana and across the continent of Africa.

Glofert’s ultra-modern fertilizer blending plant with the capacity to produce 2.400 metric tonnes of fertilizer a day, is the biggest such facility in the sub-region. Glofert has the capacity to supply all kinds of fertilizers notably: Urea, Ammonium Sulphate as well as NPKs which are widely used by farmers in Ghana and across the continent of Africa.