Accra, Aug 27, GNA - Professor Samuel Sefa-Dedeh, Dean, Faculty of Engineering Sciences, University of Ghana, has called for a value-chain approach rather than concentrating on increasing the production of crops to modernize the country's agriculture sector.

He said though increasing production was good, adding value to the produce would help champion the modernization agenda and make the country's crops acceptable on the international market. Professor Sefa-Dedeh made the call when he delivered the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences' (GAAS) inaugural lecture in Accra on Wednesday, which formed part of activities to mark the GAAS' 50th anniversary celebration.

The topic was "Modernising Ghana's Agribusiness: Science, Technology, Engineering and Indigenous Bioprocess Systems".

He said issues of land acquisition, accelerating irrigation infrastructure, access to credit and agriculture inputs, promoting selective crop development, improving access to extension services, among others, which grabbed the attention of governments only went to ensure agricultural production at the expense of value addition. Professor Sefa-Dedeh said scientists, technologists and engineers trained in handling and managing the transformation of foods and the markets needed to reorient their strategy to suit the tastes of consumers.

He said in view of the nature of consumers, who had varied tastes; attention must be paid to issues of quality and standards to meet their demands.

Professor Sefa-Dedeh wondered why people had resorted to other means of food preservation that were unhygienic and posed health safety issues to consumers rather than the traditional methods of preserving food, which ensured safety. He called for informal education and other means of information sharing to promote good handling, processing and packaging of food. Professor Sefa-Dedeh suggested that pilot plants for testing innovative processes and products should be established to enhance the modernizing of the sector.

He also called for the setting up of small scale co-packing facility to provide services to the small and medium scale food enterprises on processing and packaging, to make their activities meet the requirements of food safety regulations.