Desert Lion Donates To Ashanti RCC To Help Fight COVID-19
Desert Lion International has donated spraying machines and other valuable items to Ashanti Regional Coordinating Council to aid the Market fumigation exercise slated for Monday.
Dessert Lion is Ghana-based Agri-company that assembles spraying machines, motorcycle, try-cycle, farming machines, and other insecticides to help Ghanaian farmers.
The items worth thousands of Ghana cedis also included face masks, long boots, overall clothes, insecticides among others.
The exercise is part of the authorities’ swift intervention to prevent the spread of deadly Coronavirus in the region.
Ashanti regional minister Hon. Simon Osei Mensah thanks the company saying the items will speed the disinfection exercise to be carried out in Kumasi.
According to him, 23 markets within the metropolis will be closed from Monday to begin the fumigation.
He added other markets at other places within the region will also carry out some exercise.
He said, all mechanisms implementing to aid better exercise is done, mentioning the engagement of the security support and all other stakeholders consultation is set.
Receiving the items Mr. Mensah applauded Desert Lion for such good work to support the country’s GDP.
“Coronavirus at this critical moment is telling us to be independent as a nation to produce and use our own manufacturing products”. He quipped.
According to him, the spread of Coronavirus, means nations that suffer are those that rely most on other nations for all imports of goods and services.
“There is a ban on all country borders and airports, therefore if you can’t or don’t produce as a country what will you do?“. The minister questioned.
He, therefore, called on all meaningful Ghanaians to start patronizing our own goods to help local manufacturers in business to produce more.
He, however, Urged government institutions to patronized Desert Lion products, which will help create employment for the young since the production process is not complete until it reached the final consumer.
Mr. Kwame Tweneboah Koduah the chief executive of Desert Lion international says the presentation forms part of the company’s social responsibilities to support the nation at a critical moment of the COVID-19 fight.
He said, the fight is what government can’t do all alone but is a collective effort by all meaningful Ghanaian to contribute their quota.
According to him, this is the moment that the presence of local companies will be most appreciated since the government can’t do any imports.
He urged government to built capacity of local companies in the nation to be more efficient and up doing.
This, he said, will contribute significantly to the country’s GDP.
Desert Lion Supported MoFA Ahead Of Farmers Day
The ministry of food and agriculture has received Agric Cocoa inputs worth over GHc25,000.00 to support National farmers day slated for Friday, December 7th.
The items were donated by Desert Lion international company in Kumasi last weekend.
Desert Lion international company is a producer of quality Cocoa inputs products for the sub-region. It is also the main hub of assembling agric mechanical machines in the country.
The items included 1 Desert lion motorised pruner, 1 D lion port 500 sprayers, 1D lion turbo sprayer, 2 Desert lion oil palm harvester, 1 D lion knapsack, 10 D lion cutlass, 100
Akate Global 4000 insecticide, 12 D lion farm boots, 12 Googles nose mask among many others.
Presenting the items, the chief executive officer of the company Mr Kwame Tweneboa-Koduah said, “the presentation is in line with the company corporate social responsibility towards socio-economic development”.
This kind gesture according to him, is geared towards supporting farmers ahead of the National 57th farmers day celebration.
This is the first time the company is sponsoring a national farmers program, however, it has magnificently contributed to similar district farmers day, and district Ministry of food and Agricultural over past decades of years.
According to him, the company is introducing a private mass Cocoa spraying project next the year 2019 to support other government agric flagship interventions.
In view of this, Mr Tweneboah-Kodua reiterated his outfit has already trained hundreds of local mechanics to support the private mass spraying projects.
This according to him will help supplements what the government has already commenced.
The project he said will provide about 30,000 peoples jobs in the cocoa-growing areas, thereby attracting and encouraging more youth in the agric sector.
“This will go along way to improve the cocoa sector and increase output and the income level of the country, as well as reducing poverty”.
Speaking in an interview with Modern Ghana, he expressed the company’s commitment to equipping farmers on the proper application of insecticides and technical operation of mechanical machines.
He said the company is instituting credit scheme to fetch farmers loans. He advised and urged farmers to unite to access loans.
Receiving the items, the deputy Agric Minister Hon. George Oduro applauded management for such kind gesture.
He hinted government is committed to supporting farmers to grow the economy. According to him, the planting for food and jobs has come to stay.
He said the government has outlined several incentives to support farmers welfare.
Desert Lion Company Ltd. presents agric inputs to KNUST
The Vice-Chancellor of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Prof. Kwasi Obiri-Danso, has called for a stronger partnership between the university and the private sector to produce skills needed for the industry
More importantly, he said there was a need for this collaboration in the agricultural sector which had been described as the backbone of the Ghanaian economy.
Prof. Obiri-Danso said this when Desert Lion International Ltd (DLI), a local agriculture inputs manufacturing company, located in the Ejisu Municipality in the Ashanti Region, presented some items to the university.
The items donated were one tricycle, five pairs of steel boots, five helmets, 10 knapsack sprayers and 12 pairs of farm boots.
They were produced with the technical support from students and staff of the university and formed part of a 10-year partnership between KNUST and DLI.
Under the partnership agreement, engineering students of the university were attached to the company to help in the design and manufacture of products.
The company is, thus becoming a training ground for the students and the lecturers for the experiment and for an industrial internship.
More engagement
The vice-chancellor said the university would be engaging more with the company to develop innovative products for the agricultural sector.
He appealed to the government to support the company in order to reduce the bill of importation and the pressure on foreign exchange.
Prof. Obiri-Danso was grateful to the company for the donation and promised to provide it with feedback on the performance of the items.
Samples
The Chief Executive Officer of the company, Mr Kwame Tweneboah-Koduah, explained that although most of the items produced by the company had been approved and adopted by COCOBOD for the cocoa sector, the company thought it wise to send samples to KNUST for testing and recommendations.
He said since it was the students from the university that provided the scientific and technical support for the production of the items, there was the need for the institutions to use the items and give its feedback to the company to improve on its works.
He said through the help of KNUST, the company had been able to produce more than 20,000 tricycles which had been supplied to farmers throughout the country.
Some of the farming inputs produced by the company are motorised pruners, herbicides, snake repellents, knapsack sprayers, industrial nose masks, weed slasher and bed bugs sprays.
Private mass spraying
He said the company would from May, this year, introduce private mass cocoa spraying exercise to complement the work of government in the cocoa sector.
The objective is to make the service available to farmers who might not be able to wait for their turn to benefit from the government’s programme to have their farms sprayed and save their crops from diseases.
Mr Tweneboah-Koduah said the company intended to employ about 35,000 youth for the mass spraying exercise.