Money for food security project

The government of Ghana will receive about US $434,000 from the Commonwealth Local Government Good Practice Scheme (CLGGPS) to build food storage facilities in the country's 110 districts in the next five years, the Ghana News Agency (GNA) reported on Wednesday.

It quoted Ghana's Local Government and Rural Development Minister Kwadwo Baah-Wiredu as saying that the five-year CLGGPS fund would help build infrastructure and human capacities in the districts to ensure that enough food is preserved during bountiful periods.

The minister who had just returned from a Commonwealth Local Government Forum in Brisbane, Australia, noted that food security constituted a big challenge to both farmers and the government.

He added that a high percentage of food, including yams, plantains, maize and tomatoes go to waste after good harvests.

Ghana will also benefit from private and public resources from the Commonwealth countries to support the District Response Initiative on HIV/AIDS which was launched in August this year, GNA said.

"I convinced the delegates that sustainable development cannot be achieved if many of our employable human resources die of AIDS and malaria," GNA quoted Baah-Wiredu as saying.

"This revelation fired the interest of the Canadian delegation at the forum and they pledged to support Ghana to combat AIDS and malaria in a sustainable manner," he said.

He, however, said that the offer for the support in the fight against HIV/AIDS came as a result of Ghana's allocation of one percent of the District Assemblies Common Fund to support the fight against the AIDS pandemic and malaria.