China pledges support for Ghana's agriculture development

The Chinese government has reiterated its support for Ghana in developing its Savannah zone through agriculture, infrastructure and technology development.

Opening the China-Ghana Economic Cooperation Forum here on Tuesday, Chinese Ambassador to Ghana Sun Baohong said food was critical in the development of every country.

"Food is the first necessity of the people. Agriculture is the source of people's food and clothing for survival and the foundation of national industrialization and economic development," she stressed.

In China, she said government always attached great importance to agricultural development and established the four tasks of industrialization, informatization, urbanization and agricultural modernization to build a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way.

"While the four tasks are complementary and form an organic whole, yet without agricultural modernization to fulfill industrialization, informatization and urbanization would be like water without a source and a tree without roots," the ambassador noted.

Sun described the Savannah Accelerated Development Authority zone as full of great potentials that needed to be harnessed for Ghana's development.

"SADA Zone abounds in natural resources, including up to 8 million hectares of land suitable for commercial agriculture, rich mineral resources such as gold, bauxite and manganese as well as inexhaustible renewable energies of solar, wind and hydro power.

"The Chinese side will, under the spirit of the forum initiatives, uphold the guideline on China's relations with Africa featuring sincerity, real results, affinity and good faith, encourage and support Chinese companies to explore cooperation in SADA Zone, and further lift China-Ghana economic and trade cooperation to a new high," she promised.

The Savannah Accelerated Development Authority (SADA) was established to bridge the developmental gap between southern Ghana and the Savannah belt comprising the Northern, Upper-East, Upper-West, Volta and Brong-Ahafo Regions.

The forum was therefore organized with the aim of promoting the joint development of SADA zone by China and Ghana to step into substantial stage, and facilitate the China-Ghana trade and economic cooperation to achieve more fruitful results.

Chinese firms operating in the various sectors of Ghana mounted desks to answer questions from potential partners.

Deputy Minister for Trade and Industry, Ibrahim Murtala Muhammad, lauded China's assistance to Ghana over the years.

"It is important to acknowledge that China has provided enormous technical and economic assistance within its capacity and made frantic efforts to promote the development of cooperation between the two countries. Infrastructural evidences are rife on the assistances the Chinese government has provided Ghana." Endit