International Ghanaian Model Victoria Michaels

Rice is one of the world's most important basic foods for about half of the world's population and provides a source of livelihood to about two billion people worldwide.
Rice has become the second most important staple food after maize in the Ahafo Ano North District of Ashanti and Ghana as a whole. Its consumption therefore keeps increasing as a result of consumer habits, ceremonial events and population increase.
The rice industry is one sector that has suffered the brunt of importation. The sector over the years has been made to compete with imported rice, thus pushing local rice farmers out of business.
According to the National Rice Development Strategy (NRDS 2009) nearly 80% of local rice is produced under lowland conditions by small scale rice farmers in Ghana making it inadequate for the consuming public.
Thus, strengthening of domestic rice production and distribution system of the cereal with market competitiveness is an urgent and critical issue from the viewpoint of food security and saving foreign currency.
In view of this the Government of Ghana requested the Japanese Government to lay down master plan for promotion of domestic rice industry. The Japanese finally planned an integrated Development Programme composed of plural development based on three categorized rice farming systems, irrigated rice, semi-intensive rain-fed rice and lowland rain-fed rice and upland rice.
Consequently the government of Ghana determined to implement Rain-Fed Rice Promotion Programme due to the fact that about 80% of domestic rice is produced semi-intensively in low land in the country, and to the expectation that big impact will be created for poverty reduction, therefore requested the Japanese government to implement the project dubbed "Sustainable Development of Rain-fed Lowland Rice Production in Ghana".
The project involves the planting of rice in rows, the use of salt, egg and water to separate good paddy rice from bad ones before nursing them as well as proper farm management to impact positively on poverty reduction by supporting rice farmers.
The project is a joint collaboration of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MOFA) and Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) in nine (9) districts in the country of which Ahafo Ano North is a beneficiary.
The project is aimed at increasing productivity and profitability of rice cultivation in rain-fed lowland areas through adoption of technologies. The project is to provide a boost to lowland rice production by effectively utilizing all the available technical resources for optimum yield.