ANALYZING PRODUCTION CHALLENGES PLAGUING GHANA’S AGRICULTURAL SECTOR: A FOCUS ON POULTRY PRODUCTION IN GREATER ACCRA

ABSTRACT Ghana has abundant viable land and a reasonably well educated population that can support different types of agriculture including crop production and animal husbandry. Unfortunately, in the last several years, the agricultural sector has been performing poorly and poultry production has suffered from liberal trade policies that have exposed it to competition from imported products, forcing an almost exclusive focus on egg instead of meat production. At the birth of the country, the agricultural sector was the main contributor to the nation’s economy with cocoa as the dominant foreign exchange earner. However, the contribution of agriculture to GDP has reduced, falling behind the industrial and services sector. The objective of this paper was to identify and discuss the challenges affecting agricultural production by focusing on the poultry sector. The challenges are then ranked in order of severity using a reliability test known as the Kendall’s Coefficient of Concordance in order to make recommendations to help mitigate the problems. The research employed a mixed methodology (both quantitative and qualitative methods) and used primary data gathered from the Greater Accra region, specifically six poultry farms to attain accurate and reliable results. Current significant production challenges in Ghana’s poultry sector include: high cost of feed; competition from imported birds; outbreak of diseases; pests; access to finance and power supply. In terms of rank, the top problem is high cost of feed. To enhance poultry production, the NPP government can subsidize feed and focus on building processing plants in its one-district-one factory initiative to provide a market for locally produced birds.