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Leading policymakers, academics, and industry experts gathered in Accra on Thursday, 20th November, for the Agriculture Modernization Conference, held under the theme “Innovative Agricultural Transformation and Sustainable Growth in Africa.” The forum brought renewed attention to the continent’s urgent need for modern, youth-driven agribusiness systems capable of addressing food insecurity, climate vulnerability, unemployment, and slow industrialization.
Delivering the keynote address, Elizabeth Ofosu-Adjare, Minister for Trade, Agribusiness, and Industry, reaffirmed Ghana’s commitment to building an agricultural sector that drives national and continental economic growth. She highlighted major allocations in the 2026 national budget—GH¢245 million for the Feed Ghana programme and GH¢200 million for the Ghana Buffer Stock Company. These investments, she explained, are designed to strengthen food security, curb post-harvest losses, and reduce Ghana’s dependence on imported foods, which currently cost the nation more than US$2.5 billion annually, especially in rice, poultry, and processed foods.
“Agricultural transformation is not just about providing food,” she stressed. “It is about shaping Africa’s economic destiny.” She emphasized the need to connect farms to factories and markets through agro-processing, product certification, and value addition, while championing the expansion of Industrial Parks and Special Economic Zones. The Minister further called attention to technological modernization—mechanization, climate-smart agriculture, digital platforms, and efficient cold-chain systems—as well as the importance of robust partnerships between academia and industry.
Addressing the conference, Dr. Forster Boateng, CEO of Operations at the Tree Crop Development Authority (TCDA), placed Ghana’s efforts within a broader continental trajectory. He noted that although Africa possesses 60% of the world’s uncultivated arable land, the continent still imported USD 97 billion in food between 2021 and 2023. This gap, he argued, reflects both a challenge and an unprecedented opportunity. Central to solving it is Africa’s youth—who must view agriculture not as a fallback option, but as an exciting, technology-driven enterprise.
Dr. Boateng highlighted six strategic pillars for accelerating Africa’s agricultural transformation:
- Shift from subsistence farming to market-oriented agribusiness, integrating production with processing, logistics, and trade.
- Scale modern technology, including drones, precision agriculture tools, and digital trading platforms.
- Implement coherent, investor-friendly agricultural policies, drawing inspiration from successful models such as Morocco’s Green Morocco Plan.
- Promote multi-stakeholder cooperation, ensuring alignment between governments, private sector actors, farmers, and development partners.
- Empower youth as agripreneurs, citing Ghana’s E-HAPPY initiative under the Mastercard Foundation as an example of impactful youth engagement.
- Translate continental agendas into national action, leveraging opportunities under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).
“Now is the moment,” he declared. “Let us turn vision into action and make agriculture Africa’s next global success story.”
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The conference concluded with a resounding call for unity and shared responsibility. Participants—including government representatives, private sector leaders, financial institutions, academia, development partners, and youth groups—agreed that Africa’s path to prosperity hinges on competitive, resilient, and sustainable agricultural value chains. With deliberate investment, innovation, and harmonized policy efforts, stakeholders affirmed that Africa can not only feed itself but also fuel industrialization, create millions of jobs, and position itself as a global powerhouse in agribusiness.
