Agriculture and Agribusiness
Agriculture remains a key sector in the economy of Ghana and employs almost 45% of the population.
The goal for the future is to increase domestic production and reduce import dependency while strengthening key exports. In 2017, the administration of President Nana Akufo-Addo continued to focus on revitalizing the agricultural sector. Through new agricultural foundations, the Ministry of Food and Agriculture and other stakeholders are working to improve production and exports of agricultural sectors in the coming years.
Cereals
In contrast to the general slowdown in the sector in recent years, the cereal production segment recorded growth (+ 17% Rice, + 6% Maize). This trend continued throughout 2017, prompting the Government to set ambitious targets to increase medium-term production of both Maize (+ 30%) and Rice (+ 49%).
The Government has also launched a program to improve food production and job creation in areas such as processing and packaging, which could provide high incomes for farmers.
Processing Industry
There are many opportunities for investment in the processing of agricultural products, such as cereals (corn, rice, millet) starchy crops (yam, cassava, sweet potato), carrots, cabbage, eggplant, tomato, fruit (pineapple, papaya, banana, mango,orange), industrial crops (rubber, sugar cane, cotton, palm oil, coconut) breeding (cattle, pigs, poultry, sheep) and fisheries (tuna, tilapia, catfish).
There are also silkworm breeding for the production of raw silk.
Tropical Fruits, Preserves and Juices
As million of people around the world look for healthier and organic food, fruits are growing in demand both locally and globally. Africa remains one of the world's largest producers of some of the most popular fruits on the planet, like citrus, pineapple, bananas and many others.
Despite the perfect fit that Africa's tropical climate and soils have for pineapple, very few countries on the continent are big producers of the fruit.
Ghana is one of the Africa's largest producers and exporters, making more than $50 million every year from the pineapples it sells to Europe
The country is a producer of tropical fruit of good quality, but there are no processing plants for the production of preserves, juices and dried fruit.
Cocoa and Coffee
Ghana is the world's second largest producer of cocoa, with an annual production of between 750,000 and a million tons. Thanks to the foundation of Ghana Cocoa Board, in 1947, the country managed to regulate the sector and become not only the second largest cocoa producer, but also to increase product quality to the highest standards required by the market. In addition, the Ghanaian Government collaborates closely with the Ivorian one (the world's leading producer) in order to follow a unified trade line that allows the two world cocoa leaders to have one voice at international level. Further strategies will be implemented for the protection and improvement of farmers' conditions. However, despite the great investments and the direction taken, in the country there are no processing plants, which would allow to export a product with higher added value. Also for coffee, of robust quality, there are no on-site processing facilities.
Cashew
Another important agriculture sector is the cashew production. Approximately 75,000 farmers in the country are engaged in cashew cultivation.
Cashew is currently Ghana's leading agricultural non traditional export, generating about US $ 197 million in 2016.
The Gepa has expressed optimism of reaping a significant increase in cashew export earnings, targeting over US$250million from international trade of the commodity in 2018.
Given the importance of the sector, the President of Ghana decided to launch a Cashew Development Plan. The Plan will help to resolve issues of infrastructure and other needed government support for cashew.
Technology and Services
The strong demand for technology and services in the agricultural sector offers opportunities for investment, especially for irrigation and rental of heavy equipment (eg tractors, plows, harrows and combine harvesters, etc.).
Likewise, opportunities for investing in storage, transport and packaging are important.