We need a budget with a unique perspective – GTLC

Bolgatanga-Ghana, Nov. 23, GNA – Mr. Ibrahim Akalbila, the National Coordinator, Ghana Trade and Livelihoods Coalition (GTLC) has called for a budget with a distinct perspective that will enable Ghanaian citizens to measure outcomes and impact of the resource allocations.
He is expecting that the budget would spell out how the national resources would benefit Ghanaians so that all can measure outcomes and more specifically the value put in investment for the agricultural sector.
Mr Akalbila whose outfit is a policy advocacy organization, working in areas of food and nutrition security, (FNS) Post Harvest Loss Management, trade facilitation and inclusive market system facilitation and Gender Responsive Budgeting (GRB), and financial inclusion, made the call in an interview with the Ghana News Agency in Bolgatanga, on his expectations of the budget, said it was the only way to ensure that sectors under resourced were appropriately planned for.
He said with the growing impact of global crisis and its implications on the Ghanaian economy, it would be prudent for government to zero down on the way it made interventions to ensure that resources would be felt by all the sectors.
“Even if it is starting progressively from the MMDAs, we will learn our lessons and replicate the lessons in other Assemblies,” he said.
Speaking on responsive gender budgeting, Mr Akalbila said it was not only about women as some male famers had only small portions of land and had more challenges than women.
He indicated that along all the categories of farmers, there was the need to know how to put in interventions that would make all farmers more productive and for that, the activities involved needed to be budgeted and implemented to support those identified to be vulnerable and in most need, to enable them to be effective.
The National Coordinator said it was important to ensure that proper agricultural systems were functioning well and other complimentary issues such as data and information which were key to inform planning and budgeting readily available to complement.