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Ms Patricia Blankson Akakpo, Program Director of the Network for Women’s Rights in Ghana (NETRIGHT) has said that COVID-19 has affected the country’s food systems.
He said that even though there were challenges, it has also created opportunities, which stakeholders have embraced to stay afloat.
Ms. Akakpo, speaking at the stakeholder meeting, said it was also to find out how policies and programs were mitigating these impacts.
The meeting organized by NETRIGHT and the Institute for African Studies sought to assess the impact of COVID-19 on the livelihoods of fishermen and farmers, including any coping strategies that may have been adopted during the pandemic.
The project is part of a larger project coordinated by the Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, South Africa on ‘the impacts of COVID-19 responses on the political economy of African food systems’ in three countries: South Africa, Tanzania and Ghana. .
He said the sector was negatively affected by the pandemic, especially during the shutdown period that restricted the movement of fishermen and farmers.
She said they were unable to transport their products to market, which resulted in most of them spoiling.
He said that women fishermen and farmers suffered the most and said that most of the support, especially in the fishing sector, went to male fishermen, who owned canoes.
Ms Akakpo said, however, there were opportunities in preserving fish, adding that the pandemic had helped them adopt ways to better preserve their fish.
He also said that he offered them the need to mobilize and brought them together to make demands on the government.
Mr. Emmanuel Asare, Program, Monitoring and Evaluation Focal Person at the Development Action Association, said CSOs advocated for privileges for women fishermen and farmers.
He said they advocated for women fishermen to also have subsidized outboard motors, which were initially given only to canoe owners.
He said they were running programs and educating them on how to deal with climate change, which also affects their productivity.
Mrs. Sarah Aryee, a farmer, said they also had challenges with climate change and said it was as terrible as the pandemic.
He said the unpredictability of the weather made it difficult for them to plan the planting season.
Source: GNA
