Cocoa Farmers Cry Out For Pensions Scheme

By Saul Sebag-Montefiore

The production of Cocoa provides one-third of Ghana’s economy, yet after a lifetime of service the Nations’ farmers are left vulnerable and penniless without any form of pension scheme to support them in their old age.

In an interview Mr Ebenezer Appiah, the Clerk Marketing Officer of Cocoa Distribution at the Ajumako Bisease produce buying division, stated:

‘We are appealing to the Government to set up a pension scheme for cocoa farmers. The farmers want a pension scheme because if they work to an old age there is no background, support or money given to them by the government and unless they have their own savings they are in economic difficulties. If the Government gives them a pension scheme they can go to the bank and get something to support their lives, so we are praying that we are doing something that will get the government to see the struggles of farmers and give them economic support in the future.’

Mr Ebenezer Appiah

In 2010 490,000 tonnes of cocoa were produced by farmers; making Ghana the second largest cocoa producer in the world providing 16% of the world’s total. The Government relies heavily on the revenues generated by agriculture, which accounts for 37.3% of GDP. For this reason it can only be described as outrageous and despicable that farmers who are so central to the growth of the Ghanaian economy are effectively left to rot and die by the Government after devoting a lifetime of hard labour to producing Ghana’ primary cash crop. Therefore it would surely be just and prudent to answer the calls from men such as Mr Appiah to set up a pensions scheme to pay back the elderly of this country for the crucial role they played in funding the development of Ghana.

Looking across the courtyard of the Ajumako Bisease Produce Buying Division, amongst the drying cocoa beans is an ancient woman sat down, wearily plucking the small black beans out of the rich yellow cocoa pods. She stiffly raised her wizened head to look up at me through the curtain of heavily lined, sagging skin with pained bloodshot eyes after decades of intense difficult labour. An eighty year old woman should be sitting at home, surrounded by grandchildren, knitting, eating fufu and basking in the benefits of a lifetimes work. Instead she, like so many farmers, are condemned to struggle to survive for the remainder of their lives without being duly rewarded for the significant contributions they have made to Ghana.