By Akua Barden
For decades, coconuts in Ghana have been treated as background noise. We drink the water, extract the milk to cook rice, press the oil, and use the leaf spines to make brooms, then sweep the rest of its benefits aside and move on. We have had no strategy, no ambition, and no serious national plan to fully explore and exploit the coconut plant.
That quiet neglect is exactly why the conversation on Radio Ghana this morning matters.
What the interview revealed is simple but overdue: coconut is not a subsistence crop; it is a global industry worth over $25 billion, rising toward $30 billion in the near term. Ghana ranks twelfth globally in production and first in Africa, producing roughly 500,000 metric tonnes annually. That is not a footnote, that is leverage.
Yet for years, Ghana has participated in this market largely as a raw material supplier, leaving value, jobs, and foreign exchange on the table.
The Coconut Value Chain Initiative seeks to change that, and its significance goes far beyond farming.
Every part of the coconut has economic value. Coconut water alone commands billions globally. The husk feeds a biochar industry valued at over $5 billion. The shell supports biomass energy and manufacturing, while refined by-products serve animal feed, cosmetics, and industrial processing. Nothing is waste. Everything is usable.
That makes coconut a rare opportunity for agro-industrialisation, not just agriculture.
The vision outlined in the interview is ambitious but necessary. Doubling plantation acreage from about 90,000 hectares to 180,000 hectares is not about planting trees for statistics. It is about building an integrated value chain that links production, processing, branding, and export. It is about turning farms into businesses and crops into industries.
Critically, this initiative understands something past agricultural policies often ignored: young people will not enter farming without structure, support, and profit.
Coconut offers exactly that. It is a long-term investment crop, productive for 30 to 50 years and requiring relatively low maintenance once established. With proper varieties, disease resistance, and training, it becomes a stable income source rather than seasonal survival. The early response, with over 2,000 applicants in the first phase, shows that young Ghanaians are not afraid of agriculture; they are afraid of neglect and failure without support.
The monitoring structure matters too. GPS mapping of farms, structured certification, and regional tracking are not bureaucratic excess; they help public investment avoid waste and ensure farmers meet standards that promote productivity and accountability.
Equally important is the focus on capacity building. Distributing seedlings without knowledge has failed before. This time, farmers are being trained in modern practices, organic pest control, branding, post-harvest handling, and peer-to-peer knowledge transfer through farmer networks and extension officers. That is how ownership is built, not through speeches, but through skills.
There is also a deeper national point that should not be missed.
Every farmer participating has been reminded that this is not a gift; it is a national asset entrusted to them. Productivity is not just personal profit, it feeds foreign exchange earnings, stabilises the currency, and supports jobs far beyond the farm. When agriculture is treated as sovereignty, discipline follows.
If this initiative succeeds, the impact will be felt well beyond coconut-growing regions. Processing plants, logistics, packaging, branding, and export services will expand. Rural economies will strengthen. Imports will decline. Ghana’s agro-industrial footprint will grow.
But success will depend on consistency.
This cannot become another pilot project that fades with time or politics. The global market will not wait. Other producers are moving fast. Ghana must match vision with execution, patience with persistence, and training with enforcement.
Coconut has always been here. The difference now is that Ghana is finally treating it for what it is: an industry hiding in plain sight.
If managed well, coconut could become one of the quiet pillars of Ghana’s economic transformation. If mishandled, it will remain just another missed opportunity we explain away in hindsight.
This time, Ghana cannot afford to look back and say it did not know the value.
