As one of the largest tomato growing communities in the country, he said with green-house technology the sector would be more attractive for unemployed young people and thereby, tackle the growing youth unemployment in the area.

Besides, Nana Boateng II said the tomato growers and other vegetable farmers in the area, mostly young women could engage in all-year production and produce quality yields too. Nana Boateng II made the call when speaking at a forum to mark the 2025 International Women’s Day celebration at Akumadan. the theme: “March Forward, Accelerate Action for Young Women”.
The Technoserve Ghana Harnessing Agricultural Productivity and Prosperity for Youth (HAPPY) Programme with support from the Mastercard Foundation and Agri-Impact, engaged the women mostly young female farmers, aggregators, and processors in the tomato value chain to celebrate the Day.

Technoserve is an international a non-profit organisation that works with enterprising people in the developing world to build competitive farms, businesses, and industries

With the 24-hour economy, Nana Boateng II urged the government to support the tomato and vegetable growers with pumping machines and irrigation facilities to enable them to increase productivity.
He urged the government to support tomato processors in the area with machines and storage facilities so that they could also add value to raw tomatoes.

By so doing, the Paramount Chief said the growers would increase production to feed the processors who could also create employment for more of the youth and thereby participate in the implementation of the 24-hour economy to spur economic and progressive development.

Nana Boateng II expressed concern about the uncontrolled application of chemical fertilizers by the growers, which was dangerous to human health and stressed the need to support the farmers in the preparation and use of organic fertilizers.

“We have a lot of cattle here and with support the farmers can use the cattle droppings and other plant waste to produce and use organic fertilizers in larger quantities.

That is safer and cheaper than the chemical fertilizers,” he stated. “In fact, women ought to be celebrated for their contributions to sustained economic development,” Mr
Frank Obiora Mgbemena, HAPPY Program Director, Technoserve stated, saying because women in the area contributed about 80 percent of the nation’s tomato production, there was the need to support, empower and inspired them to do more.

Madam Caroline Dery, the Senior Gender, and Youth Manager on Technoserve HAPPY Program told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) that the HAPPY program was a four-year partnership between the Mastercard Foundation and Agri-Impact Limited.

This transformative program is supported by an eight-member consortium Partners including Newage Agric Solutions, National Service Authority (NSA), Ghana Cares (MiDA), Ghana Enterprises Agency (GEA), Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA), TechnoServe, Catholic Relief Services (CRS) and Jobberman. HAPPY seeks to create over 326,000 dignified and fulfilling jobs for youth (70 percent women) and Persons with Disability, increase food production and productivity in rice, soya, tomato, and poultry value chains by 20 percent and reduce import of strategic foods by 10 percent.

Some of the project stakeholders later committed to the successful implementation of the project by signing a project implementation document.