About 200 farmers from various communities in the Ejisu Municipality of the Ashanti Region are to be provided with improved varieties of Taro (kooko) planting materials.
The aim is to encourage the farmers to plant the new varieties for increased yield while sustaining their livelihoods and incomes.
The Department of Agriculture of the Ejisu Municipal Assembly in collaboration with the Crops Research Institute of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR-CRI), are supplying the materials.
Mr. Solomon Gyasi Boakye, Public Relations Officer (PRO), of CRI told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Kumasi, that the new varieties were capable of resisting diseases affecting the crop.
The four main new varieties being distributed to the farmers are ‘CRI-Yen anya woa’, ‘CRI-Agyenkwa’, ‘CRI-Okumkom’ and ‘CRI-Huogbelor’.
He said the varieties were developed under the Modernizing Agriculture in Ghana (MAG) Programme.
The Programme, focus attention on demand-driven research and alternative methods of extension delivery with the objective of increasing productivity through intensive farming.
Similar programmes to distribute improved planting materials under the MAG are being implemented in the Asante-Mampong Municipality, where 300 farmers are to benefit.
The other area is Gomoa Central in the Central Region, which would also see 300 farmers being supplied with disease-resistant varieties of planting materials.
Farmers’ field day for harvesting and commencement of the distribution of the new Taro (kooko) planting materials had already been held at Ejisu.
In attendance were 76 participants, including; the Municipal Chief Executive (MCE), Ms. Beatrice Serwaa Derchie, Dr. David Anambam, the Municipal Agricultural Director, Dr Ernest Baafi, the Regional Research-Extension-Farmer Linkage Committee (RELC) Coordinator, as well as researchers and agricultural extension agents
