The theme for this year’s school, which is being held at the University of Ghana is: “Promoting National Development through Agricultural Modernisation: the Role of ICT.”

The three-day annual event, geared towards engendering discussions on topical and critical development issues, will this year be dedicated to the agriculture sector and the use of ICT to advance the sector and improve the lot of farmers.

Agriculture

The Dean of the School of Continuing and Distance Education (SCDE), which is the event organisers, Professor Michael Tagoe, in an interview with the Daily Graphic, urged Ghanaians to take opportunities offered by the school to fully participate in the event.

He observed that the agriculture sector, which employs about 44 per cent of Ghanaians, was the least performing sector even though it had the prospects to improve on the living conditions of the people.

According to Prof. Tagoe, the school will also facilitate discussions on agricultural insurance to improve access to local farmers.

Facilitators

A number of facilitators are billed to lead discussions on the various topics. They include the head of the Ghana Agricultural Insurance Pool, Mr Ali Mohammed Cato, Prof. Tagoe and the Country Representative of the ACDI/DOCA, Ghana, Dr Emmanuel Dormon.

Previous topics

Since 2014, the school has been focussing on specific sectors of the economy and how ICT can be used to improve upon performance.

The main issues discussed in 2014 was ICT Driven Education for Sustainable Development; in 2015 it was ICT in Local Government Development and last year, the topic was ICT and Health.

According to Prof. Tagoe, “We create the platform and an opportunity for all Ghanaians to discuss issues. It is then up to the sector ministries to pick up the ideas and work to roll them out.”

He added that individual public servants who attended the school went back to their respective institutions and implemented some of the suggestions.

“Unfortunately, we have not been able to track the participants to get to know how well they have implemented the new ideas gained, but we will start doing that,” he said.

The annual New Year school was instituted by Ghana’s first President, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, and has since become an annual affair.