Locally manufactured rice also known as Ghana rice, is out of stock in some stores in Tamale, the Northern Regional capital, during the festive season.

This was revealed after a visit to some stores in the metropolis to find out whether Ghanaians will eat local or imported rice this Yuletide.

Some retailers who spoke to Joy News attributed the boom in business to the launch of the ‘Eat Local Rice’ campaign by President Akufo-Addo.

According to the retailers, consumers made deliberate efforts to buy the local product.

They urged producers of local rice to produce more since Ghanaians have started patronising the produce.

“During this festive period the most patronised produce is rice and for as long as we can remember people always ask for imported rice. But not this year,” a retailer told Adom News’ correspondent, Illiasu Fatau.

Another retailer added: “First, we just had a small supply of local rice because we were not sure there will be demand but since the campaign, everyone keeps asking for local rice. We are very impressed with the way people are patronising this produce. In fact, for the first time, we have imported rice still on the shelves and the local rice is all gone,” the retailers added.

On her part, producer of Zeela Jasmin rice, a local rice manufacturing company based in Tamale, Hajia Nadiatu Ali, expressed excitement about the development.

She urged the government to support local producers financially so they can increase production and in the long term, contribute to the economic growth of the country.

“Since November this year, we have received countless orders for our product. We have also had a lot of people outside Tamale coming in to buy our rice. In fact, we had companies coming in to buy the product for their workers. The campaign on social media also got a lot of people interested in our product. We had people asking where they will get some to buy and we connected those outside Tamale to other branches.  

The President really helped but we need more support from the government. We need processing centers so we can produce more.  We work with a lot of women and the farmers too. If we produce more, their lives will improve and the economy of Ghana will improve too, so our work does not only benefit us, there is a link.”