Ghana’s economy remains undiversified and thus vulnerable to internal and external shocks. The agricultural sector, though, continues to be essential for reducing poverty and boosting shared prosperity. The recent establishment of the Ghanaian Tree Crops Development Authority is an important step towards a better enabling environment for tree crops in Ghana. For this the Authority needs further support. Local businesses/associations should increase their productivity by improving their operations and gaining better access to finance and skills.

The overarching goal of the program is to contribute to an inclusive and sustainable growth through enhanced trade and competitiveness in the cashew and oil palm value chains. Competitiveness refers to policy, farm, and processing level. For this an improved enabling environment, increased operational efficiency and enhanced quality of final products is needed. Enhanced trade refers not only to selling the final product to the market, but also depends on improved linkages, and thus trade between farmers and processors for the benefit of both sides. This addresses the inclusiveness aspects of the program’s goal. Environmental sustainability is addressed by sound environmental practices fostering increased biodiversity and efficiency at the farm and processing levels.

Outcome A: Improved enabling environment for the cashew and palm oil sectors. A coherent enabling environment is the building block of the Program’s goal at macro-level.

i: Effective Tree Crops Development Authority in place: Support to the Authority’s organisational development towards effective fulfilment of its mandate of regulating and developing production, processing and trading of tree crops in a sustainable environment.

ii: Aligned associated policies and initiatives with associated governmental initiatives and policies is crucial.

Outcome B: Higher private sector productivity and competitiveness in the cashew and oil palm value chains..

i: Strengthened businesses and associations in the cashew and oil palm value chains.

ii: Increased access to finance for SMEs in the cashew and oil palm value chains.

iii: Higher availability of skilled labour in the cashew and oil palm value chains.

Expected results:  

A.i Organizational development support to the Authority and input to reforms and programs to improve the business enabling environment of the cashew and oil palm industries

A.ii Rapid Response Mechanism set up and funding projects to improve the overall business enabling environment and its coherence with the cashew and oil palm regulations

B.i Fund set up to co-finance projects to improve operations of SMEs or associations, to support SMEs to make better use of public support programs

B.ii Co-finance projects towards improving access to finance under the Fund

B.iii Co-finance projects to increase availability of skilled labour and utilise the ATVET system by the private sector under the Fund

Results from previous phases:  

Phase I contributed to the establishment of the Tree Crops Development Authority, the Corporate Insolvency and Restructuring Act 2020 and the Ghana Investment Promotion Code 2021. In the palm oil sector, the setting up of about 240 active Village Savings and Loans Associations providing loans to 1400 members (67% female) was supported. Two rural community banks received access to concessionary financing and over 4000 processors (70% female) were trained. In the cashew sector, the program supported the establishment of 12 scion banks producing improved planting materials for 50’000 farmers over the next 25 years. It also supported organic certification of cashew farmers. Under the skills component, the program supported the setting up of Sector Skills Bodies, 821 people were trained and 4 occupational standards for new curricula were developed.