- Agrotech Fair puts youth, innovation and exports at centre of farm reset
Ghana’s EXIM Bank wants to change how people see agriculture by making it a job and export opportunity for young people, saying that using new ideas throughout the process is a better way to tackle graduate unemployment than relying on limited formal jobs.
Speaking at the launch of Agrotech Fair 2026 in Accra on Tuesday, the bank’s Chief Executive, Sylvester Adinam Mensah, said one of the central aims of the initiative is to draw younger Ghanaians into agriculture by repositioning the sector as a space for engineering, logistics, manufacturing, data and entrepreneurship, rather than subsistence farming alone.
The intervention reflects a wider policy and financing question now confronting Ghana’s economy: how to absorb a growing pool of educated young people when traditional white-collar employment is failing to expand fast enough. Mensah’s answer is that technology can make agriculture commercially attractive, operationally modern and better aligned with the aspirations of a younger workforce.
“It is observed that a significant number of young graduates continue to channel their aspirations into limited formal sector roles,” he said, describing the pattern as increasingly unsustainable against the backdrop of unemployment and changing economic realities.
In that context, EXIM Bank is attempting to widen the narrative around agriculture from production to systems. Mensah argued that agricultural technology improves farm efficiency, reduces post-harvest losses, raises quality and increases incomes, while also helping processors add value to local raw materials and exporters meet global standards and reach wider markets.
That framing matters because it positions agritech not merely as a rural development tool but as productive infrastructure with implications for export competitiveness, domestic manufacturing and value retention. For a country seeking to strengthen non-traditional exports and deepen local content across supply chains, the effort to connect youth employment with agriculture through technology is also an attempt to build a more bankable case for agribusiness investment. That interpretation is an inference from Mensah’s remarks about efficiency, value addition, exports and youth appeal.
Mensah was explicit that technology changes not only outcomes but also perception. Modern agriculture, he said, is increasingly driven by innovation, mechanisation and data, opening up opportunities that match the skills and interests of younger people who might otherwise overlook the sector. He said technology “makes it attractive to the youth” by showing that agriculture is not only about farming but also about engineering, innovation, logistics, data, manufacturing and entrepreneurship.
The fair, which runs through March 19, is intended to serve as a platform to connect stakeholders across the agricultural value chain while encouraging innovation, investment, and technology adoption. Mensah said EXIM Bank expects the event to strengthen linkages across the sector and inspire a new generation to explore opportunities within Ghana’s agricultural landscape.
The broader significance is that institutions such as EXIM Bank are beginning to pitch agriculture less as a fallback occupation and more as a structured commercial ecosystem. Whether that shift takes hold will depend on financing, execution and the ability to convert exhibition-floor enthusiasm into scalable ventures.
But the message from Accra was clear: If Ghana wants agriculture to absorb labour, create enterprises, and drive exports, technology will have to sit at the center of that transformation. That final point is a synthesis of the source’s emphasis on youth attraction, efficiency, value addition and export readiness.
