A 40-year old abandoned state farms at Okrakwadwo in the Okere District has been revived by the District Assembly, as part of an agenda to improve agriculture sector and the socio-economic development of the area.
The Okrakwadwo state farms, was established by Dr Kwame Nkrumah, the first President of Ghana in the early 1960s,s as part of the economic development drive, employing many farmers from the catchment area, however, the farms collapsed in the 1980s.
Throwing more light on the revived farms, Mr Daniel Kenneth, Okere District Chief Executive (DCE)said currently, 50 acres of oil palm plantation was cultivated and about 95 young men and women were engaged to work on the plantations.
He said the entire land size of the state farms acquired by the first President was about 300 acres, however due to the abandonment, parts of the lands were encroached upon and added that the assembly was taking steps to reclaim all the lands to expand the plantation.
Apart from creating jobs for the teeming youth in the agriculture sector to increase the Internally Generated fund (IGF) capacity of the Assembly, he noted that the project would also check the impact of climate change and attract the youth into agriculture.
He said in line with the government’s Planting for Food and Jobs and the Planting for Export and Rural Development (PERD) initiative, the assembly was taking advantage of the once vibrant state farms project to create jobs to boost the local economy.
The revived state farms project was funded by the assembly through the Ghana Productive Safety Net Program (GPSNP) and has the potential to provide over 500 source of living through direct and indirect engagement.
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