The Minister of Food and Agriculture, Mr Eric Opoku, has assured that the stalled works at the Kpong Irrigation Scheme will resume within days to help complete the project faster for farmers. 

The government, he stressed, had moved to fast-track payments to contractors to unlock the full agricultural potential of the country’s largest irrigation infrastructure.

During a working visit to the Kpong Irrigation site last Thursday, the minister disclosed that he had received four outstanding payment certificates from contractors and had already forwarded them to the Ministry of Finance for immediate action. 

He stressed that delays in payments had affected the pace of work but assured the farmers and project stakeholders that the issue was being resolved as a matter of urgency.

“I want to give you every assurance that within the shortest possible time, payment will be effected and work will resume on site,” Mr Opoku guaranteed. 

The sector minister added that the government was determined to ensure the completion of the rehabilitation works to make all 4,000 hectares of land fully available for year-round agricultural production.

The minister also mentioned that his visit was to personally verify progress on the ground rather than rely solely on technical reports. 

Mr Opoku explained that the rehabilitation of the Kpong Irrigation Scheme fits squarely within government’s Agriculture for Economic Transformation Agenda, operationalised through the Feed Ghana Programme. 

Central to the programme, he noted that it was a deliberate shift from rain-fed agriculture to irrigation-led production to safeguard food security in the face of climate uncertainty.

“Irrigation is now a priority for the Ministry of Food and Agriculture. A chunk of our resources is going into irrigation development, and Kpong, being the biggest irrigation infrastructure in Ghana, must receive the attention it deserves,” the Minister elaborated. 

He assured farmers that the government was committed to supporting all-year farming to stabilise food supply, especially in years of poor rainfall. 

He warned that while favourable weather had boosted harvests in 2025, irrigation was the only sustainable buffer against unpredictable climatic conditions in the future.

The minister again announced progress on government’s Farmer Service Centre initiative, designed to support smallholder farmers who make up nearly 80 per cent of Ghana’s farming population. 

“Under Phase One, 70 districts would benefit from fully equipped centres providing tractors, harvesters, ploughs, improved seeds, fertilisers, training facilities, maintenance units and digital tools such as drones for precision agriculture.”

“This year, we have budgetary allocation to begin implementation in the 70 selected districts. These centres will ensure farmers have unimpeded access to modern equipment, tailored inputs and technical training,” he underlined.

Addressing concerns about access to markets, Mr Opoku acknowledged that lack of reliable markets had discouraged production despite increased output by farmers. 

He announced that resources had been released to the National Food Buffer Stock Company to intervene in the market, particularly for rice, through partnerships with millers and aggregators who would procure paddy, mill it and supply the buffer stock.

He further pledged to provide an excavator to support operations at the scheme and announced that the Kpong road network would be included in government’s plan to rehabilitate 1,000 kilometres of agricultural roads nationwide to ease the movement of produce from farms to markets.

The Operations Manager of the Food Systems Resilience Programme (FSRP), Mr Philip Daniel Laryea, said the World Bank-funded project aimed to strengthen Ghana’s resilience against food insecurity, climate change and global shocks. 

He said the rehabilitation of the Kpong Irrigation Scheme, now about 75 per cent complete at a cost of US$22.5 million, would enable reliable irrigation across 4,040 hectares, increase rice yields from 4.5 to at least six tonnes per hectare and generate over 30,000 metric tonnes of rice annually.

Mr Laryea also noted that the scheme was a major economic enclave supporting rice, banana, aquaculture and industrial activities, with direct benefits to over 7,000 people and indirect impacts on more than 21,000 livelihoods.