Transforming the horticulture sector in Ghana

Looking at the future climate scenarios for Ghana and the current educational offer in horticulture, there is a significant knowledge and skills gap between theories taught from the books and the real-life climate smart agricultural practices that are needed to become a successful horticulture farmer.

To address this skills gap, 3 years ago, the Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) teamed up with the Kwadaso Agricultural College (KAC) in Kumasi and with Holland Green Tech Ghana (HGT). Their pilot had a huge impact, not only tackling youth unemployment but also in improving the broader horticulture sector, introducing climate smart practices and reaching higher yields and income for more than 1,200 farmers in Kumasi.

This project aims to scale the results of the pilot to four other agricultural colleges in Ghana and to the other regions, i.e. Volta region (Ohawu Agricultural College), Northern region (Damango Agricultural College), Ashanti region (Ejura Agricultural College) and the Bono Ahafo region (Wenchi Agricultural College), targeting a larger group of farmers and develop an innovation ecosystem that will benefit Ghanaian and Dutch actors that are active in the horticulture sector.

The project focuses on four main outcomes:

1. To stimulate the economic development in the horticulture sector by stimulating green growth and by tackling (youth) unemployment through skills development;
2. To promote climate smart practices in Ghana for food security and combat environmental and climate challenges related to horticulture;
3. To improve business performance of Ghanaian small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs);
4. To generate business opportunities and build a very relevant network and improved business climate for the Dutch actors that are, or want to be, active in the Ghanaian horticulture sector.