Minister for Trade and Industry, Alan Kyeremanteng, is embarking on phase two of his tours at various project sites under the One District One Factory (1D1F) initiative.

The latest visit was to a rice processing factory at Bokaso-Sefwi Akontombra District in the Western North Region.

According to the Minister, the rice processing factory at Bokaso-Sefwi Akontombra District in the Western North Region falls under the second module of the 1D1F program which identifies groups of farmers who lack the capacity to establish processing facilities for their produce.

By this, seed capital is injected by the government to support their productivity. 

“We may have groups of young people, we don’t want to leave them out of the 1D1F. Government will group them to help them with factories under the enabled youth 1D1F module. We provide them with seed capital and similar support to help them become investors themselves. Even in vulnerable districts where there are no investors, we will use this module to assist them”.

The rice processing factory is 65 per cent complete and expected to be completed by the end of the year. Its production capacity is expected at one and a half tonnes of rice per hour.

The 1D1F Common User Processing Facility (CUF) is an agro-processing facility made up of a building equipped with machines to process raw materials into products or convert agro-industrial materials into other products.

The CUFs are being established by the Rural Enterprises Programme (REP) of the Ministry of Trade and Industry in line with the Government of Ghana’s flagship One-District One-Factory Policy. 

They are being established with funding from the African Development Bank (AfDB) under the Agricultural Commodity Processing Infrastructure Development (ACIP) of REP.

REP is establishing 5 CUFs including the Sefwi Akontombra District Rice Processing Company at Sefwi Akontombra, Fiase Oil Palm Processing Company at Dompim/ Tarkwa Nsueam Municipal, Yoo Rice Processing Factory Limited at Savelugu, Sekyere Maize Processing Company at Nsuta/ Sekyere Central District and Dormaa Agro Company Limited (Rice) – Nkran Nkwanta/ Dormaa West District.

The 1D1F Common User Processing Facility (CUF) concept seeks to achieve technology transfer, dissemination and usage among commodity chain actors in a particular commodity value chain.

The CUF will provide services for the processing of agricultural commodities along a selected value chain. Each 1D1F Common User Facility (CUF) is being as a registered Limited Liability Company with shareholders including farmer groups, processors, marketers, transporters, landowners buying shares etc.