Introduction

The Ghanaian economy is largely regarded as agrarian due to the sector?s contribution to Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The sector contributes about 22.7 percent of GDP and employs about 50 percent of the labour force (Daily Guide newspaper, 14th February 2014).

Data from the 2010 Population and Housing Census indicate that agricultural households were 13,366,340 accounting for 54.2 percent of the total population. However, there have been shifts in the age and sex composition of those involved in the agricultural sector over a period. For instance, there appears to be a decline in the proportion of young adult males in the agriculture labour force over the last three decades.

This has resulted in a situation whereby the sector is dominated by children and the elderly. The focus of this chapter is to analyze households that are in agriculture as well as the types of farming activities these households are engaged in.

Households in Agriculture

In the 2010 PHC, an agricultural household was defined as one in which at least one person in the household was engaged in farming/fishing/animal husbandry. The number of agricultural households in the North Gonja District is 4,186 out of a total of 4,793 households in the District. This translates to about 87 percent of the total households in the District. Rural areas account for 90.6 percent of the agricultural households (Table 7.1). The high proportion of agricultural households in rural areas is basically due to the fact that agriculture is essentially a rural activity.

Types of Farming Activities

Four types of agricultural activities are identified in the census: crop farming, tree planting, livestock rearing and fish farming. Table 7.1 indicates that the highest proportion of agricultural households are into crop farming (96.4%), followed by livestock rearing (35.6%) while tree planting (0.4%) and fish farming (0.2%) do not receive high patronage in the District.

In the urban areas, the proportion of households engaged in agriculture is 54.1 percent. Majority of the households in the urban areas engaged in agriculture are into crop farming (91.9%) while livestock rearing represents 32.4 percent of agricultural households. In the rural area, however, 92.6 percent of households engage in agriculture. In terms of the type of agricultural activities of the households, about 97.0 percent engage in crop farming while 40.0 percent is into livestock farming.

Livestock and Livestock Keepers

The District has a total livestock of 73,967 with 3,094 individuals keeping them (Table 7.2). The average animal per keeper in the District is 24. The table also shows that cattle (20,738) are the most common livestock kept in the District with 553 keepers, representing an average of 38 cattle per keeper. This is followed by goats with an average of 16 goats per keeper. There are also three ostrich keepers in the District with an average of 11 ostriches per keeper.