Authors
Thomas Yeboah, Irene Egyir
Publication date
2023/4/28
Journal
Children’s Work in African Agriculture
Pages
204-232
Publisher
Bristol University Press
Description
Over the last two decades, agriculture in Africa has moved towards the top of the development agenda. The Comprehensive African Agricultural Development Programme (CAADP) was agreed in 2003, with a focus on improving food and nutrition security, and increasing incomes in Africa’s largely farming-based economies. It aims to achieve this by raising agricultural productivity and increasing public investment in agriculture (NEPAD, 2003). With new public commitments by African governments, and unprecedented investment by private actors and development partners, competing visions and models of African agricultural and rural transformation have emerged. In Ghana, the Food and Agricultural Sector Development Policy has been supported by various governments through four-year medium-term investment programmes (Ministry of Food and Agriculture, 2007). The strategy has been to use flagship projects to provide subsidies and technical information, and thereby facilitate productivity enhancement (World Bank, 2017). The current programme,‘Planting for Food and Jobs’, singles out vegetables and major grain crops for greater support (Ministry of Food an d Agriculture, 2018; Nantui Mabe et al, 2018). As vegetable production in Ghana has historically relied on children’s labour contribution, the new emphasis on vegetables will likely impact on children’s work. Children’s involvement in agriculture in Ghana can be traced to the colonial period (and was presumably present long before that). The establishment of a typical export oriented colonial economy in the former Gold Coast included the development of infrastructure including railways,
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