Locals cry foul as foreign firm grab land for rice cultivation

LandJustice4wa | 30 January 2015

Locals cry foul as foreign firm grab land for rice cultivation

This is Jokplenu an old community near Dabala in the Volta Region of Ghana.

The community owns a greater portion of the land on which Brazil Agro Business Group is currently using for their large scale rice farm.

Lolito is a nearby community which partly owns the land as well.

Amaro Saldarha is the Farm Manager at of Brazil Agrobusiness Group. The group is into large rice cultivation at Lolito, a community located on the Dabala-Keta stretch of road. According to Saldarha, they acquired the land from Biofuel Africa.

He claims Biofuel Africa folded up due to the unsuitable nature of the land about five years ago.

“We bought the land for $7000.00 about five years ago from the land owners. But after sometime we realized that the ethnic groups within the area were making claims to portions of the land. We arranged a meeting with all the ethnic groups and paid compensation to all the groups.

There is arrangement with the leader of the entire ethnic group in the person of Agbodemegbe.

An amount of $20,000 is paid yearly to the leader in the community

At a point, Amaro Saldarha says the company pay $20,000 monthly to the leader of the community. And at another point he says the payment is monthly.

About 20,000 acres of land has been acquired. $10.00 per each acre is paid monthly. This is what is amounting to $20,000.00, Saldarha said.

Few members of the two communities have been employed to work in the company.

Rice is export and also sold locally.

Water from the stream that flows by is used by the farm and the communities.

Presently some settlers have taken the company to court, claiming ownership of the land.

The case is being contended in court. The company is using part of the litigation free land for the rice cultivation awaiting verdict of the case in court.

About $3 million have been committed to the land under litigation.

A Norwegian company, Biofuel Africa has failed with his investment in Northern Region (Ghana) due to protests of farmers and the international community.

Seemingly this company has acquired shares of Brazil Agrobusiness Group.

Brazil Agrobusiness Group acquired the land from Biofuel Africa about five years ago. They claim, Biofuel Africa had to give up Jatropha cultivation due to the unsuitable nature of the land.

Lidiane Jaconi, MD of Brazil Agrobusiness Group said they bought the land for $7000.00 about five years ago from the land owners. But after sometime we realized that the ethnic groups within the area were making claims to portions of the land. We arranged a meeting with all the ethnic groups and paid compensation to all the groups.

Biofuel Africa is said to have merged with Brazil Agrobusiness Group to do rice cultivation on a large scale.

The Chief of Jokplenu, Togbe Agbottah confirmed that, Worsunu Foundation initially used the land for Biofuel production and released the land to the Brazil Agro Business Group with his consent.

About 600 farmers were displaced as a result of this investment in jatrophy and rice, according Godsway Dzotepe, a member of Dzokplenu community.

And for fear of their lives, some elders in the community find it difficult to ask questions about how the money is being used.

They say they are not getting any benefit from Brazil Agro Business Group

According to the company, they have employed many youth from the community to work on the farm.

But the youth of the community say the condition of work is terrible.

While creating jobs for unemployed youth, families have lost their livelihoods.

The youth do not appreciate the possibility to earn a good salary by doing overtime on a payment which is actually under the minimum wage. But the jobs are not enough to feed all the families who have lost their land.

Joseph Akakpo is a member of the Jopklenu community. He tells me that some of the youth have resigned from the rice farm due to poor working conditions.

Yesutor Dogbe is a twenty year old hairdresser who lives and works in Lolito. She says she does not see or get any benefit from the company.
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