Poverty Dimensions of Public Governance and Forest Management ...

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delivery services and the provision of subsidised modern inputs to farmers including chemical
fertilisers and mechanisation services. These services were skewed, focused on particular
geographical areas and concentrated on larger farmers who often built up a relationship of
clientship with government and agricultural services and rural banks dispensing soft loans.
During the 1970s large mechanised farms appeared that focussed on food production. These
commercial farmers often acquired large tracts of land that were stumped and put under
permanent cultivation. With the removal of subsidies many of these large farms have collapsed,
since the high price of inputs and of credit (bank interests rates have been around 30-40 percent in
the 1990s to present times) are not reflected in farmgate food prices.
Commercial farmers have tended to move out of food production into export crops. In Brong
Ahafo the main export crop that has been developed is cashew. The main constraints to
cultivating cashew are the cost of the seedlings, the cost of labour to create the plantation,
knowledge about cultivation techniques and markets, the cost of pesticides and access to
pesticides, and ability to gain sufficient land for large-scale cultivation Cashew is a crop for
middle and prospering farmers. Timber (mainly teak) plantations are another area in which large
farmers are interested, since it secures land for the owner, minimises labour in the long term after
the initial investment in clearing the plantation, and promises good returns. Major problems for
investment in plantation are the risk of fire and the problems of discounting capital on a long-term
investment. The commitment of the government to a timber plantation development project with
loans for farmers and outgrower type relations with timber companies may make timber
plantations more attractive to large farmers in the future. However, small farmers may have
insufficient land available to participate in plantation schemes. This may lead to more rural
poverty as land becomes increasingly scarce as large farmers expand areas of production in
response to government incentives and loans, which small farmers are unable to access.
During the 1970s and 1980s there was some trickle of modern technologies in the vicinity of
government agricultural projects, such as state farms. These farmers ploughed their land with
tractors, invested in fertilisers since they were cheap. This was mainly used for maize cultivation.
However, ploughing frequently destroyed the topsoils and farmers had to continue using
fertilisers to produce adequate yields of maize. With free market prices for fertilisers these
farmers found the price increase in fertilisers was not realised in the price for their crop, but that
they could not get good yields of maize on their land without the use of fertilisers. In these areas
there is frequently a decline in agricultural production, in which agriculture may be abandoned
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