The government says it intends to gradually shift the focus of agriculture in Ghana from one of subsistence to an agribusiness-focused one using the 2019 National Farmers' Day as a starting point.

Agriculture has, for centuries, been done on subsistence bases with a few practitioners focusing on it as a business.

As a result, the youth find it unattractive.

The Minister of Information, Mr Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, at a news briefing in Techiman on Sunday, 8 September 2019, said the Akufo-Addo-led administration desires to engineer a paradigm shift and cause many more investors, especially young persons, to approach agriculture as a business.

Mr Nkrumah announced that the Volta Region will host the 35th edition of the National Farmers' Day celebrations on the theme: “Enhancing Small-Scale Agriculture Toward Agribusiness Development”.

The Minister of Finance, Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, will, on Wednesday, 11 September 2019, officially launch the 2019 Farmers Day celebrations with a focus on having a paradigm shift for the sector to see agriculture as a business that responds to the economic growth of the country and not just agriculture for purposes of farming to feed the household.

The National Farmers’ Day celebration offers a unique opportunity for a collective assessment of the impact of farmers and fishers on the national economy. It also provides the opportunity to identify key problems in the sector, most importantly those that affect the welfare of farmers and facilitates solutions.

Mr Nkrumah disclosed that the one-day celebration will, this year, be replaced with an 8-day agricultural fair.

“The essence of the fair is to give the opportunity to award winners and the good people of Ghana to see new machinery, learn new technologies and research innovations”, Mr Nkrumah said.