Ghana’s president Kwame Nkrumah built large and tall silos (food storage towers) in 1965 to help Ghana store cocoa beans and other products in order to drive prices high in the international market.

In a bid to achieve a balance in productivity as a way of expanding beyond the limits of the domestic market, Dr Nkrumah attempted to develop storage towers (silos) across the country for commodities such as cocoa and grains for national food self-sufficiency and export.

The silos with a storage capacity of about 200,000 tonnes were built at a cost of £8.5 million. As at the time it was built, Ghana was the world’s leading producer of cocoa, producing more than 40 per cent of the world’s annual output.

The silos would have ensured regulated pricing of Ghana’s major commodity export, cocoa in the international market. The project was eventually abandoned after Kwame Nkrumah was removed through coup.