Rubber Tree Tapping Level 3

Who it is for. People who have finished Rubber Tree Tapping Level 2, or who already manage tapping tasks or a rubber farm and can show the same skills. Trainees must be 18 or over: Ghana bans hazardous work, including work with machines and chemicals, for anyone under 18. In Ghana's TVET qualifications framework, National Proficiency II covers varied work, mostly routine, under limited supervision, while National Certificate I covers complex and varied activities under minimum supervision. This module is written at that advanced level. It is an honest comparison, not an accreditation.

Bridge from Level 2: what you already know

Level 2 did not cover how to size and supervise a larger tapping force, inspect quality with a score sheet, keep yield records by tapper and block, plan intensification and nutrition, read the legal position of seasonal tappers, compare outgrower and contract models, register and finance a business, keep a full set of books, or present a plan to a panel. Level 3 covers all of these. Units 5 to 7 go deeper on business than the hub's Money Skills Level 2 and Entrepreneurial Thinking Level 2: read those first.

How the module works

Each unit has learning outcomes, performance criteria, the range and the evidence your assessor needs. You are judged Competent or Not Yet Competent. About 70% of the time is practical, following CTVET's Oil Palm split of about 30% school and 70% workplace.

Competency standard

Range. A plantation or farm group of at least 2,000 trees with several tasks. Evidence. Task map and rota; quality score sheets; briefing observation; risk assessment; problem log.

Tasks and the size of the tapping force

A task is the block of trees one tapper taps in one morning. A tapper covers about 300–400 trees a morning. On a plantation you do the arithmetic in four steps:

1. Trees in the block (count from the farm card).
2. Tasks = trees ÷ task size.
3. Tappers needed = tasks ÷ the number of days in the cycle (2 for d2, 3 for d3), because each tapper owns that many tasks and taps one each day.
4. Add relief tappers for sickness, funerals and rain. One relief tapper for about every ten tappers is a sensible starting rule (our suggestion, not from a source).

Example (all numbers are examples): a block of 20,000 trees, task size 400, system S/2 d3. Tasks = 20,000 ÷ 400 = 50. Tappers = 50 ÷ 3 = 16.7, so 17. Add 2 relief tappers = 19. On S/2 d2 the same block needs 50 ÷ 2 = 25 tappers. Low-frequency tapping saves labour, and in many plantations tapping and collection is the biggest cost of making rubber.

A Malaysian study on large estates found that raising the task from 600 to 900 trees on a 100-hectare field cut the tappers needed from 17 to 11 and raised the area per tapper from 6 to 9 hectares, and yields were not hurt when tapping finished by 11:30 a.m.. The same article reports that tapping and collection took 61% of the cost of producing a kilogram of rubber on Malaysian plantations. That is Malaysia, with stimulation, bigger machinery and different pay systems. In Ghana start with 400 trees, watch the quality scores, and enlarge a task only if the cuts stay good. Tapping late cuts the yield by about a third, so a task that cannot be finished near daybreak is too big.

The rota and the daily rhythm

Draw a task map: number every task, show its trees, its tapper and its day. Under d3 each tapper owns three tasks (A, B, C) and taps one each day, so every tree is cut once in three days. The same tapper must tap the same trees each time, so cuts and bark use stay even (Level 2). A tapper who is absent is covered by a relief tapper, who is not allowed to cut deeper to "catch up".

Rules that go in the rota:

• Never tap a wet panel after rain. Decide before dawn who walks the rows to check, and what the team does on a wet day (weeding, tool sharpening, fire-belt clearing, cup washing).
• Rest the trees about two months in the dry season. Plan the rest for the whole plantation so tappers can plan their pay and other work.
• Rain guards save tapping days and cost about 6 to 8 extra tapping days to pay back.

Example daily rhythm (our suggestion; adjust to your daybreak): lamps and briefing before first light; tapping from daybreak; collection of cups and weighing later in the morning; a short quality check; records written the same day. The exact times belong in your own standard routine.

Quality control of tapping

Poor tapping ruins trees for years: a company planning to train 3,500 farmers as tappers warned that a tree tapped wrongly cannot be used well for the next 30 years. Quality has four parts you can check with a ruler and your eyes:

• Depth: never wound the cambium; the best yield comes from cutting to less than 1 mm from it.
• Thickness of the shaving: about 1.25 mm, the thickness of a fingernail.
• Slope: about 30°.
• Bark use: no more than about 20 cm a year on S/2 d2 or 15 cm on S/2 d3. That is about 1.7 cm a month on d2 and 1.25 cm a month on d3 (our division of the yearly allowance by twelve).

A Sri Lankan research study of tapping quality used bark audits and looked at excessive bark consumption and panel dryness as the damage that poor tapping causes. Bark use is the best single number: if a tree uses its yearly bark in eight months, the shaving is too thick.

A weekly inspection sheet (our design). Every week, the checker (or you) picks ten trees at random from each tapper's tasks and scores each tree:

A tapper scoring 45 or more out of 50 is on standard (our suggestion: set your own pass mark with the owner). A ladder of action keeps it fair: a coaching talk with the tapper at the tree, retraining on practice bark, moving the tapper to a lower-risk task under a checker, and finally stopping the tapper. A wound to the cambium is always at least a coaching talk the same day.

Supervise, train and pay fairly

• Brief every tapping day: weather, who is absent, which panels are wet, any dry or sick tree to avoid, and one quality point.
• Train on practice bark first. A new tapper practises on old or dead bark before touching productive trees (Level 1).
• Give feedback on the spot, with the ruler in your hand, not after the damage is done.
• Write down complaints and answer them within a day.
• Pay incentives that reward quality. A Malaysian account describes systems with a basic wage plus an incentive for weight above a set amount, and enlarged tasks that raised tappers' wages by 53% in one study. Use these only as ideas: they fit large estates with stimulation.
• Pay on time and in front of the team. Reliability is what keeps good tappers.

Safe and lawful work for tappers

Do a risk assessment before the team starts: list each hazard (dark, snakes, knives, chemicals, back strain, mining pits, fire), who is at risk, what controls you will use, and who checks. Injuries among tappers are mostly knife cuts and skin irritation, snakebites keep workers off longest, and in one study no one wore protective gear. Over half of tappers in another study had backache, and many had cuts, eye injuries and chemical injuries.

What the Labour Act, 2003 (Act 651) says. The Act has a general duty on every employer to make sure workers work under satisfactory, safe and healthy conditions, to provide protective equipment at no cost to the worker, to give information, training and supervision, to provide clean drinking water and washing facilities, and to prevent accidents (s.118). A worker who has reason to believe there is imminent and serious danger must report it and may remove himself or herself, and the employer may not dismiss or withhold pay for it (s.119). Employers must report occupational accidents and diseases to the government agency not later than seven days after they happen (s.120). Breaking the s.118 duties without reasonable excuse is an offence.

Seasonal and casual tappers. The Act defines a casual worker as a worker engaged on work that is seasonal or intermittent, for no more than six continuous months, and paid by the day (s.78). A casual worker's contract need not be in writing, but the worker must get equal pay for work of equal value, access to any medical facility the employer provides for workers, overtime pay, and the full minimum pay for each day the worker attends, whether or not weather stops the normal work (s.74). A temporary worker employed continuously for six months or more is treated as a permanent worker for that Part of the Act (s.75). The daily minimum wage for 2026 is GH¢21.77.

Accident cover. The Workmen's Compensation Act, 1987 (P.N.D.C.L. 187) makes employers liable to compensate workers for work injuries and listed occupational diseases whether or not the employer is at fault, and a 2025 legal article says it covers casual and temporary employees and that employers are required to insure their statutory liability. Premiums were not found; get written quotes from National Insurance Commission-licensed insurers. Keep a first-aid kit and the snakebite plan at every task.

Solving a problem you have not seen

When something happens that is not in the book, use five steps: (1) Make safe: stop work if people or trees are at risk. (2) Find the facts: what, where, since when, how many trees; use your records. (3) List two or three options and the cost of each. (4) Decide, and tell the owner if the decision touches the panel, the money or the law. (5) Record what you did and check the result after a week.

Example problems to practise on: a cluster of dry panels in one block; the weight slip does not match the delivery book; two tappers quarrel over a task; a tapper is bitten by a snake; strangers are digging near the plantation edge; heavy rain arrives for five days; the buyer rejects a load as dirty. For strangers digging, keep away, do not confront them, and report to the owner, GREL or the police: galamsey destroyed over 19,000 trees on 40 hectares in one Ahanta West case.

Competency standard

Range. A plantation with at least two blocks of different ages or panels. Evidence. Panel plan; stimulant calendar; yield sheets; dryness survey; recommendation note.

The panel sequence for 24 years

The Rubber Research Institute of Sri Lanka's plan is this. Tap one half of the trunk (one panel) for about six years, then move to the other half, then come back to the renewed bark; the tree is tapped for at least 24 years. The lower end of the cut starts about 120 cm above the highest point of the graft union, and renewed bark is tapped from the same starting height after the panel has been left to renew for about 12 years. The guide labels the panels A, B, C, D in order, with the virgin bark panels B0-1 (A) and B0-2 (B) and the renewed bark panels BI-1 (C) and BI-2 (D).

The calendar year in which a panel opens is the number you write on your panel plan.

Clones and systems. The guide says half spiral every second day (S/2 d2) suits many clones, and half spiral every third day (S/2 d3) suits clones such as PB 28/59, PB 217, PB 235, PB 260, RRII 105, RRIC 130 and RRISL 217. It also says clones tapped on d3 should be planted in separate blocks from d2 clones. Which clones grow in Ghana and which system GREL recommends for each was not found; a 2025 study of grafted and tissue-cultured trees of clone RRIM 600 covered estates in Ivory Coast and Ghana, but that is one clone and the study's findings were not read. Write the clone on every farm card and ask GREL. Advice for the same clone differs between countries: Sri Lanka lists PB 235 for every-third-day tapping, while a trial in south-east Côte d'Ivoire found S/2 d4 6d/7 with 8 stimulations a year the best system for PB 235.

Intensification and controlled upward tapping: manager's decisions

Late in a tree's life, bark use may be intensified to get the most yield in the last six years before replanting. The Sri Lankan scheme adds an upward quarter cut on the opposite higher panel in the first three years of intensification (about 150% of the normal bark use), two half-spiral cuts in the fourth and fifth years (about 200%), and four half-spiral cuts in the final year (about 400%). Upward cuts are made at 45°, and the distance between an upward and a downward cut should be more than 50 cm. The same guide describes controlled upward tapping (CUT), which can extend the tapping life by about four years, but it uses 5% ethephon monthly on d3 with rain guards.

This is not a tapper's decision and it is not yours alone. Intensification and CUT use bark fast, raise the risk of dryness, and depend on the clone, the tree's health and the replanting plan. You prepare the data (age, panel, bark left, dryness percentage, yield trend) for the owner or GREL, who decide. Never open an upper panel without written agreement.

Low-frequency tapping and the stimulant calendar

Stimulant lets trees be tapped every third or fourth day with about the same yearly yield, and bark use is lower. The Sri Lankan advice is a band of 2.5% ethephon, 2.5 cm wide, applied 0.5 cm above the cut, 4 to 5 times a year for d3 and about 9 times a year for d4, with tapping 48 hours after application. Too much stimulant can dry the panel. Ethephon is corrosive and can permanently damage the eyes.

Your job as a manager is the calendar and the record, not the brush:

• Prepare the calendar of application dates with the trained applicator, and mark the 48-hour wait on the rota.
• Record date, block, product name, concentration, who applied, PPE used, and the tapping date after application.
• Stop stimulating any panel that shows dryness, thin latex or late dripping, and report it.
• Keep product labels and safety data sheets in the farm office. Only trained people apply stimulant, with registered products (see Unit 3).

Yield records: what to record and how to read it

Yield is often logged as grams of dry rubber per tree per tapping, called g/t/t. Where you only have wet cup lump, record the wet weight and the buyer's DRC if you know it, because the buyer's price is for wet cup lump. The farm-gate minimum price announced in January 2023 was based on a standard DRC of 58%.

For every task and every tapping day or week, record: date, block, task number, tapper, trees tapped, rain or wet panel, stimulant given, wet lump weight, and notes. Add up each month. Then calculate:

• g/t/t (wet) = wet weight in grams ÷ (trees tapped × number of tapping days).
• Dry weight = wet weight × DRC (our calculation; use the buyer's DRC or an agreed estimate).
• kg/ha/year = (g/t/t ÷ 1,000) × trees per hectare × tapping days in the year. This is our own conversion, not from a source.

Example (all numbers are examples; the Level 1 and Level 2 examples used a deliberately cautious 1,500 kg of wet cup lump per hectare per year): a task of 400 trees gives 12 kg of wet cup lump on a tapping day. g/t/t wet = 12,000 g ÷ 400 = 30 g. With 500 trees per hectare and 100 tapping days in the year, kg/ha/year (wet) = 30 ÷ 1,000 × 500 × 100 = 1,500 kg. If the DRC is 55%, the dry weight on that day is 12 × 0.55 = 6.6 kg, which is 16.5 g/t/t dry.

How to read the numbers. Compare each tapper's g/t/t with the average of the block. A tapper far above the average may be cutting too deep or taking extra trees; a tapper far below may be skipping trees, selling lump on the side, or working a tired panel. Compare month with month and the same month year on year. An early yield fall of about 15 to 20% with thin, late-dripping latex is a sign of tapping panel dryness. Never decide from one day: use four to eight weeks. A change in g/t/t is a question to ask, not a verdict.

Dryness survey

Once a quarter, walk each block and count the trees with dry panels (no latex or very little, late dripping, thin latex). Dryness percentage = dry trees ÷ trees counted × 100. There are two kinds: fatigue dryness, which may recover with rest, and brown bast, which is deeper damage and is usually not reversible. The usual remedy is to rest the tree and change panel, then tap at lower intensity; rest trees 3 to 12 months. No Ghana threshold for "too much dryness" was found; agree one with GREL, and meanwhile treat any rise from one quarter to the next as a reason to look at tapping intensity, bark use and stimulant records.

Competency standard

Range. A replanting block, a nursery visit and a mature block. Evidence. Replanting plan; nursery visit notes; nutrient plan and quantity sheet; scouting and treatment records; immature-years plan.

Where seedlings come from

From 3 July 2026 only seedlings certified by the TCDA may be distributed for rubber, cashew, coconut, oil palm, mango and shea. The TCDA plans to distribute more than three million elite rubber seedlings in the Western, Central and Eastern regions, and had distributed 60,000 elite seedlings by July 2026. How a farmer applies and what it costs were not found: ask the TCDA zonal office. Do not sell seedlings or budwood unless you are an approved supplier (see Level 2). What you must understand, even if you never run a nursery, is how good planting material is made.

Budwood, budding and nurseries (understand, do not sell)

Commercial rubber plants are budded: a bud from a high-yielding clone is grafted onto a young rootstock plant, so the tree has the root of one plant and the yielding crown of a chosen clone. Key facts from the research institutes:

• Budwood nursery: plants of one clone are grown only to supply bud sticks. A well-managed nursery uses only authentic planting material from the research institute, never more than one clone in a block, a plan with every planting point numbered, a name board with clone and year, and a record of budwood cut.
• Spacing and life: a budwood nursery of 1 m × 2 m holds about 5,000 plants per hectare, can supply about 50 buds per plant after the fourth year, and is replanted after about 10 years.
• Budwood: buds for young budding come from green shoots of about 9 to 10 weeks' growth, cut early in the morning, and packed in moist sawdust if transported far.
• Young budding in a polybag nursery gives a two-whorled plant in about 9 months, against about 10 to 12 months for green or brown budding.
• Nursery fertiliser: polybag plants get a 10:10:4:1.5 NPKMg mixture monthly, starting at 10 g per plant and rising to 30 g.
• Why clone purity matters: a mixed clone block cannot be tapped on one system. Buds, stocks and plants must be labelled, and over-budding old clones is not practised.

What you check when you receive seedlings: the TCDA certificate or label with the clone name; sturdy, healthy plants of the same size and stage (for example, two whorls of leaves for budded polybag plants); no leaf spots or wilting; moist roots and an intact polybag. Reject any batch without a label. The exact TCDA tests for "certified" were not found: ask.

Replanting plan

• Spacing: 420 to 520 plants per hectare is recommended, in rows that run east to west for the most sunlight on flat or gently sloping land. Your clone and your owner may set a different density.
• Planting pit and first feed: pits of about 60 × 60 × 75 cm were used for budded plants in Sri Lanka, planted at the start of the rains. In India a planting pit gets 12 kg of compost or well-rotted cattle manure and 200 g of rock phosphate mixed into the top 20 cm of soil; newly cleared forest needs only the rock phosphate.
• White root precautions (Level 2): mark infected patches and remove infected roots; do not move stumps to other parts of the farm; change the planting points and row spacing between cycles; plant a creeping cover crop such as Pueraria and never Mucuna in white-root-risk areas.
• Gap filling: plan a few extra seedlings to replace plants that die in the first year (about 10% is our suggestion; ask the TCDA or GREL).
• When to open the field for tapping: when 70% of the trees have reached 50 cm girth at 120 cm above the bud union, about five years after planting by FAO's rule of thumb, or about six years in a Ghana economic analysis that notes farmers must wait for six years to see the benefits.

A nutrient programme

Rubber soils in Sri Lanka are often short of nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), potassium (K) and magnesium (Mg), and fertilizer in the right proportions corrects this. The Sri Lankan system is a good model for how to think, even though its rates are for Sri Lankan soils:

• Base the plan on analysis. For mature fields, fertilizer recommendations are based on foliar (leaf) analysis with soil and other data, intended to cover three years, after which a resurvey is due. Whether a Ghana laboratory offers this for rubber was not found: ask GREL.
• Split the dose and avoid weather extremes. Apply the yearly amount in as many doses as practical; do not apply in the height of the dry season or in prolonged heavy rain, when nutrients are wasted or washed out.
• Mature trees: for doses below 1 kg per tree apply once, within a month after the tree's new leaves have come out (refoliation); for more than 1 kg, apply in two parts.
• Place it in the soil. Fork or pocket the fertilizer into the soil; broadcasting on the surface wastes nitrogen. In the first year apply in a weed-free circle 25 to 30 cm from the plant, widening to about 100 to 120 cm by the fifth year, then at two to four points around the tree.
• Do not mix dolomite with urea. Keep them apart in the field because ammonia is lost when they meet.
• Example mature rates in Sri Lanka (grams per tree per year, soils low in K and Mg): on virgin bark 200 g urea, 100 g rock phosphate and 200 g muriate of potash; on renewed bark 150 g urea and 150 g potash, with no rock phosphate. These are not Ghana doses. Use them only for the exercise below.
• Buy only from registered dealers. The Plants and Fertilizer Act, 2010 (Act 803) controls the manufacture and use of, and trade in, fertilizers. Keep the bag label and receipt.

A plant health programme

You learned the signs of the main diseases in Level 2. At Level 3 you run a programme:

1. Scout every month. Walk each block along a fixed path, inspect a sample of trees (the same trees each time), and record leaf damage, bark growths, white strands at the base, dry panels and fire risk. A tapper sees each tree more often than the owner, so use the tappers as scouts and collect their notes weekly.
2. Know the wet-weather risks. Abnormal leaf fall is worst after prolonged heavy rain; powdery mildew with light rain and cool, misty nights; black stripe after long heavy rain, spread by rain splash and tapping knives; mouldy rot on low panels in wet, weedy conditions. Keep weeds down at the base and do not tap wet panels.
3. Act early on white root disease. Trees with more than 50% of the collar still healthy can be treated with a systemic fungicide by trained people, while trees with more than half the collar dead are removed with all infected roots.
4. Keep fire belts of 5 to 7 m around the plantation in the dry season.
5. Record every finding and treatment with date, block, tree numbers, what was seen, what was done, who did it and the result.
6. Report new or fast-spreading problems at once to GREL or the TCDA. FAO lists South American leaf blight as the world's most serious rubber disease. The EPPO plant-pest database (Europe and Mediterranean Plant Protection Organization) records it only in the Americas, with no country in Africa listed. No Ghana survey report was found, so treat it as absent but watch for it.

Ghana-registered products only. In Ghana the Environmental Protection Agency regulates all pesticides sold, distributed and used, and its Chemicals Control and Management Centre reviews them. About 1,070 pesticides were registered and approved by December 2023. Fungicides are pesticides. The Environmental Protection Act 2025 (Act 1124) consolidated older environmental laws including Act 917; whether it changes how pesticides are registered was not verified. Plant Protection and Regulatory Services Directorate officers are reported to register and inspect pesticide dealers under Act 803. Use this checklist before you let anyone treat a block:

The immature years

For about the first six years the plantation earns nothing from rubber and costs money every year. Tasks in each year: weeding or mulch and cover-crop care, fertilizer as planned above, fire belts, gap filling in year one, scouting for disease, protecting the young plants from animals, and girth measurement from year four. Plan these as a calendar with costs, because the cash-flow pattern of the immature period is the biggest risk in rubber (Unit 6).

You can raise cash during these years: plantain grown between young rubber rows was profitable in a trial in Ellembelle and Jomoro, a Ghana analysis of rubber agroforestry notes that intercropping with food crops can lessen the waiting time, and rubber trees give nectar for bees. GREL's outgrower model plants only one hectare a year, so that families can grow a food crop and a cash crop in parallel. A contractor can earn by managing immature blocks for owners at a price per hectare per year. Always get the owner's agreement for intercrops: they take water and nutrients, and shade young rubber if planted too close.

Competency standard

Range. Cup lump deliveries from at least two tasks; a market and rules visit. Evidence. Quality log; weigh slips; settlement statement; model comparison; rules sheet.

Forms of rubber and how they are graded

Smallholders sell cup lump (latex that sets in the cup), sheets, or sometimes latex. GREL buys wet cup lump from outgrowers at weighbridges. GREL's factory makes granulated, or crumb, rubber, at over 20,000 tonnes a year according to a 2013 brochure. Factory-made natural rubber is graded under the technically specified rubber system, where grades such as TSR 10 and TSR 20 can be made from clean field coagulum such as cup lump, and the grade is set by laboratory measurements. The international standard ISO 2000:2020 sets the TSR grading system. One market's contract for TSR 20 listed maximum dirt of about 0.16 to 0.2% and ash of 0.8 to 1% by weight. Those are not Ghana farm-gate limits. For you as a contractor, the practical lesson is that dirt, sand, bark and stones lower value and are removed with effort in the factory, so you are paid, and remembered, for clean lump.

How GREL assesses dry rubber content at the weighbridge, and whether Ghana has a farm-gate grading standard for cup lump, were not found. Farmers' leaders said in 2016 that GREL deducted 58.5% of the cup lump value as water before pricing, and also alleged weighbridge discrepancies; this is their account and no GREL reply was seen. The January 2023 minimum price was based on a standard DRC of 58%. Ask GREL, in writing if possible, how weight, DRC and deductions are decided, and keep your own scale and records so you can check a slip.

A quality plan for cup lump

Write it as a one-page standard and pin it up in the shed:

If a buyer rejects part of a load, find out why (dirt, wrong weight, low DRC), photograph it, and record it. A pattern pointing to one tapper's task is a coaching job (Unit 1).

Field latex and sheet. Latex that sets too early can be kept liquid with sodium sulphite in the field, 15 to 50 ml of the stock solution per litre of latex, but only if your buyer agrees. Sheet needs a roller mill and smoke house and a buyer: no Ghana price, buyer or grade standard for tapper-made sheet was found. The Level 2 trial sheet remains a skill and a possible group project, not a business plan, until you have a buyer's order in writing. A Malaysian study reports that collecting cup lump in polybags every two weeks together with enlarged tasks cut transport costs by 37%. Whether a Ghana buyer accepts such lump was not found.

Who buys, and what the rules say

• GREL is the main buyer for outgrowers, with weighbridges at Apimanim, Tsibu, Awodua, Subri and Allabokazo in the Western Region. Its price was GH¢9.30 per kg of wet rubber for September 2026. Confirm the October price before you plan. Phone +233 (0)31 200 2600 or write to info@grel-siph.com.
• The TCDA (Act 1010 and the Regulations, 2023, L.I. 2471) requires registration and licensing of tree-crop value chain actors, including aggregators. A conveyance certificate is needed to move rubber and other tree crops, obtained from TCDA zonal offices or checkpoints. Fees were not found. The TCDA's rubber page lists five licensed categories (aggregator of cup lump, trader of raw rubber, raw rubber processor, exporter of processed rubber, exporter of raw cup lump): registration is done once and the licence is renewed every 24 months. Its fee table is in a separate document that could not be read: ask the zonal office. A tapper is not one of the listed categories. From 1 June 2026 nursery operators, service providers and input dealers for rubber and other tree crops must also register under Regulations 17 and 18 of L.I. 2471, so an independent tapping contractor should ask the TCDA in writing whether that applies.
• The raw rubber export ban: in April 2026 the government banned raw rubber exports for ten years. RUPAG, the processors, says the restriction supports local processing, and RUFAG, the farmers' association, says processors pay low prices and are slow to pay. Those are their claims. Watch the price and the news.
• Traceability. A study of how the European Union's deforestation regulation affects Ghana's rubber smallholders exists. Its findings were not read for this manual. The European Commission lists rubber (and products such as tyres) among the goods covered: they must not come from recently deforested land, and they must be produced in line with the laws of the country of production. The rules apply from 30 December 2026 for large and medium firms and from 30 June 2027 for micro and small firms. These duties fall on the firms that place rubber on the EU market, not directly on Ghana tappers, but those firms will ask their suppliers for proof. Keep a farm map, a land document and delivery records for every farm you serve, because buyers who export to Europe may ask for proof of where rubber came from. Exactly what a Ghana buyer will ask for was not verified: ask GREL.

Outgrower and contract models

The GREL outgrower model. Since 1995 GREL, the Government of Ghana and financing partners have invested €59.1 million in the Rubber Outgrower Plantation Project (ROPP), helping about 8,012 individuals develop 30,155 hectares; a self-finance scheme in which GREL is the technical operator has supported 1,650 farmers on 15,193 hectares. A 2013 brochure described an outgrower plantation as four hectares run by one family, planted one hectare a year, with a GREL commitment to buy the rubber for up to 35 years. Check what GREL offers today before you rely on that.

An independent evaluation for the French development agency (AFD) explained how the lending works and where it struggled:

• A tripartite lending agreement links GREL (technical operator), a bank, and the farmers' association (ROAA).
• The target hectares were planted and farmers said they now had regular income from rubber, but there was no quantitative data to support that.
• Side-selling to other cup lump buyers grew significantly from 2016, because the price from those buyers was often higher once all costs were counted; this cut GREL's latex deliveries and hurt loan repayment.
• Interest added during the grace period (while trees were still immature) increased the loan capital significantly and threatened farmers' ability to repay.
• Lessons: clarify roles; use a mediator for disputes (the TCDA could be one); farmers should be well represented; and loans need a guarantee that can really be enforced.

What this means for a contractor. If you tap an outgrower's farm, you may be working on a plantation whose owner owes a loan that is repaid through rubber deliveries. Know that, write down who the buyer is, and never help an owner side-sell to dodge a loan: it ruins the owner's credit, and yours.

Models for paying and working with tappers.

The share ratios and wage patterns above come from a Thai study, and the task bonus idea from Malaysia. Thai ratios depended on the plantation area, the labour situation and the age of trees. No Ghana tapper pay data was found. Choose a model, write it down and test it for one season.

Cooperatives and groups

A group can bargain, share a scale and transport, train together and borrow together. Ghana's Co-operative Societies Decree, 1968 (N.L.C.D. 252) provides for a Registrar of co-operative societies appointed by the President and allows a society to be registered, with or without limited liability, if its object is the promotion of the economic interest of its members (ss.1 and 2). The rest of the Decree could not be read; a court case summary suggests an application needs at least ten qualified members. Cooperatives are not registered at the Office of the Registrar of Companies; get an organisational TIN from the Ghana Revenue Authority. The Department of Co-operatives route and current fees were not verified: ask the Assembly or the Department.

Good group habits: written bye-laws; elected officers; minutes; one bank or MoMo account with two signatories; a weighing book open to every member; money shared in front of everyone; and annual accounts. The group's savings can be built the way village savings and loan associations work, and the Ministry of Finance has a programme to link such groups to banks. No official register of tapper groups was found (Level 2).

Competency standard

Range. Sekondi-Takoradi and the rubber districts of the Western Region; a tapping contractor with about 12 hectares, or a family plantation of about 4 hectares. Evidence. Model and form comparison; registration checklist; start-up budget; funding table; worker agreement; one-page plan.

See the hub's Money Skills Level 2 and Entrepreneurial Thinking Level 2 for the general ideas of budgeting and starting a venture. This unit is specific to rubber.

Three rubber businesses

An aggregator needs TCDA registration and licensing and a conveyance certificate to move rubber. The costs were not found, so treat the aggregator business as a later step once you have a track record.

Choose a legal form

Companies are governed by the Companies Act, 2019 (Act 992). Annual returns cost GH¢175 a year; late filing is charged GH¢1,000 for one to four years late and GH¢2,000 for five years or more. The ORC fee list for all types is on one page.

Which form? A tapping contractor starting alone usually begins as a sole proprietor. Two partners who put money in need a written partnership agreement before any money moves. A plantation with several owners, a bank loan or outside investors may prefer a company, because liability is limited to unpaid shares. A group of farmers selling together may form a cooperative (Unit 4). Review the form once a year.

Registration step by step

1. Choose a name and register at the ORC for your form (above), and keep the certificate. Renew yearly.
2. Get your TIN. Your Ghana Card PIN has been your individual TIN since 1 April 2021; companies receive a GRA TIN after registering with the ORC.
3. Choose your tax route. Residents with only business income who are not VAT-registered can use the Modified Taxation Scheme: turnover up to GH¢20,000 pays fixed instalments, and GH¢20,001 to GH¢750,000 pays 3% of turnover or uses the modified cash basis; it is paid by *880# or the MTS app, and professionals, owners of several businesses or outlets, and partners are excluded. Companies pay 25% standard income tax, with provisional tax each quarter. Whether farm income has a special concession was not verified for rubber: ask the GRA.
4. VAT. From 1 January 2026 the VAT Act, 2025 (Act 1151) raised the registration threshold for goods from GH¢200,000 to GH¢750,000 a year; the effective rate is 20% (15% VAT plus 2.5% NHIL and 2.5% GETFund). For services there is no turnover threshold: ask the GRA if your tapping fees might be treated as services.
5. Business Operating Permit from your Assembly. In Sekondi-Takoradi use the STMA portal; fees are in the STMA fee-fixing resolution. For farms in Ahanta West, Ellembelle, Jomoro and other districts, ask that Assembly. Check the renewal date.
6. TCDA registration and licence if you buy, carry or sell rubber (above). Whether a tapper working for an owner needs one was not verified: ask the TCDA zonal office.
7. EPA and fire. Ask the EPA district office whether a smoke house, sheet-making, or storage of chemicals needs a permit. The Environmental Protection Act 2025 (Act 1124) consolidated earlier laws including Act 917; the permit rules for rubber were not verified. Ask the Ghana National Fire Service whether your shed needs a fire certificate (see Workplace Safety Level 2).
8. Employees. Register workers with SSNIT when you hire. See "Hire, supervise and insure" below.
9. Bank or MoMo business account, so that business money is not mixed with your own (Unit 6).
10. Land and farm papers. Before you tap or plant, ask the owner for a land document or lease and the farm card. The land rules were not researched for this manual: ask the Assembly, the Lands Commission or a lawyer.

Premises and location

Choose a base near a cluster of rubber farms, a weighbridge and a clinic, away from galamsey zones (Level 2). Your base needs: a dry, shaded, raised store for lump; a place for the scale; a locked cabinet for knives, forms, first-aid and (if any) chemicals kept apart; a desk for records; and water. Check that the shed does not flood. Locations that give good returns are close to the farms you tap, because fuel and time are costs.

Start-up budget (example): a tapping contractor with 5 tappers and 12 hectares

All numbers below are examples. Headlamp prices of about GH¢55 to 72 for budget lamps were asking prices on Jiji Ghana on 7 October 2026, mostly in Accra.

The reserve is the sum of the fixed costs, loan payment and drawings you must still pay when the trees are resting. Fixed costs of GH¢1,060, loan repayment of GH¢500 and drawings of GH¢1,500 make GH¢3,060 a month. You will build this up in Units 6 and 7.

A plantation owner's budget is much bigger and slower. As an example only, assume GH¢12,000 per hectare in year 1 for clearing, lining, pits, certified seedlings, planting and first feed, then GH¢4,000 per hectare in each of years 2 to 6 for weeding, fertilizer, fire belts and protection. A family plantation of 4 hectares planted one hectare a year therefore needs much more money than a contractor. These are not Ghana cost data: none was found, and the Ghana outgrower evaluation noted large differences between farms. Get quotes from GREL's outgrower unit.

Finance

Possible sources, from cheapest and safest to most risky:

• Your savings and a savings group. A village savings and loan association builds funds from members' savings, and the Ministry of Finance has a programme to link these groups to banks.
• Licensed microfinance or a bank. Check that the lender is licensed, ask for the interest rate, fees, grace period and what happens to unpaid interest. The Bank of Ghana policy rate was 14.00% when its site was checked.
• Ghana Enterprises Agency (GEA). GEA runs programmes such as SME GO, Business-in-a-Box, SME High Growth and Kaizen, and Business Advisory Centres in Takoradi, Shama, Effia-Kwesimintsim, Mpohor and Ahanta West. Its financial-support page was out of date when checked.
• Government programmes in the 2026 Budget: GH¢401 million for a Women's Development Bank, GH¢170 million for a National Apprenticeship Programme, GH¢160 million for Adwumawura and GH¢110 million for the 24-Hour Economy. Whether a rubber contractor can use these was not verified: ask the GEA.
• Loan guarantees for agriculture: GIRSAL says it guarantees agricultural loans with partner lenders. Ask your lender whether a rubber loan can qualify.
• Outgrower finance for new plantations. Past schemes lent through a bank with GREL as technical operator. Whether new loans are open today is not verified: ask GREL's outgrower unit.
• Assemblies' disability fund: it rose from 3% to 5% of the common fund from 2026, and a 2026 report says the use shifts to skills and assistive devices.

The one-page business plan and your pitch

A 60-second pitch (example): "I am Efua Mensah and I run Mensah Tapping Services in Ahanta West. We manage 12 hectares for three owners with five trained tappers, under written agreements, and we deliver clean lump with signed weigh slips every fortnight. I need GH¢12,000 to buy a motorbike and a scale. My break-even is about 470 kg of wet lump a month and we tap about 1,500." Practise yours aloud.

Hire, supervise and insure

The Labour Act, 2003 (Act 651) requires a written contract for jobs of six months or more (s.12) and a written statement of terms within two months (s.13); notice rules (s.17); 15 working days of annual leave (s.20); and 12 weeks' maternity leave (s.57). Casual workers must be paid the full minimum for every day they attend (s.74). The 2026 daily minimum wage is GH¢21.77. Apprentices and sharecroppers are outside the Part of the Act on casual and temporary workers (s.73(2)), so write a clear apprenticeship or tapping agreement anyway, with training, duties, pay, safety and how it ends. Do not employ anyone under 18 for tapping.

For employees on a payroll, the SSNIT contribution is 5.5% from the employee and 13% from the employer of basic pay; the employer pays within 14 days after month-end. PAYE is due on the 15th of the next month. Unit 6 shows an example.

Safety, insurance and compliance. Provide boots, gloves, lamps and safety glasses at your cost, as the Act requires (Unit 1). Buy cover only from National Insurance Commission-licensed insurers, and verify at nic.gov.gh. The Workmen's Compensation Act covers work injuries. Whether other covers are compulsory for you was not verified. The National Apprenticeship Programme funding in the 2026 Budget may help you take an apprentice; ask the GEA.

Market yourself

Your cuts and your clean weigh slips are your best advertisement (Level 2). A WhatsApp Business profile has a catalogue and automatic greetings. A free Google Business Profile lets people nearby find you; verification can be by phone, email, video or postcard. Keep a portfolio with dated before-and-after panel photos, bark-use charts and references (with the owner's permission), put your name and number on a board at your shed, and join outgrower groups. Never claim a licence or experience you do not have.

Accessibility

Tapping needs standing, walking in the dark and hand control (Level 2), but a business has many roles. Persons with disabilities can lead a tapping business by running records, scouting from a seat, grading and weighing lump, sheet processing, supplies, honey or training. These are our suggestions, not from a source. Ghana's Persons with Disability Act, 2006 (Act 715) is reported to give employers a tax rebate for hiring persons with disabilities, and it requires accessible public places, but audits show many are not accessible. The GEA has a PWD Enterprise Support Programme. Practical changes in a rubber business: a ground-level weighing area, a wide firm path to the store, a seat at the scale, voice notes for records, large-print rotas, buddy pairing at dawn, and accessible training.

Competency standard

Range. One month of contractor records (own or sample) and a one-hectare multi-year plan. Evidence. Cash book; settlement statements; monthly statements; costing sheet; forecast; tax note.

Basic bookkeeping is in the hub's Money Skills Level 2. Here the examples are specific to rubber. All figures in this unit are examples: no Ghana data on tapper pay or farm costs was found.

Records you keep

• Weigh slips: every weighing, numbered, signed by the owner or witness and kept in order.
• Settlement statements: for each delivery, the weight, price, value, shares and deductions (below).
• Cash book: every receipt and payment the same day, with a receipt number.
• Tapper pay sheet: kg of lump per tapper, rate, advances recovered, net pay and signature.
• Advances ledger (debtors): money you have lent tappers or owners and repayment dates.
• Petty cash: a small float for daily costs; top up on a voucher.
• Asset register: each tool, scale and vehicle, date, cost, life.
• Suppliers (creditors): who you owe.
• Receipts and invoices: give a receipt for every fee you charge. Get a receipt for every cost.
• Farm files: farm cards, agreements, tapping logs and yield sheets (Unit 2).

Keep owner and business money separate: pay yourself a fixed drawing from the business account. Keep records in Ghana for at least six years from the end of the year of assessment or VAT period. A spreadsheet is enough to start. Zoho Books offers a free plan with limits and Wave has a free starter accounting plan; check their terms.

Tapper shares and the settlement statement

In share contracts, the share ratio says what part of the crop value goes to the owner and what part to the tapper or team. In a Thai study the ratios were 60:40, 55:45, 50:50 and 70:30. The value is the weight times the price per kilogram on the buyer's slip.

Settlement statement (example): Farm A, first fortnight of March 2027.

Signed: owner ____ team leader ____ date ____. One copy each. Price per kg changes monthly, so write the source and date of the price on every statement.

The tapper pay sheet (example). The contractor pays hired tappers GH¢2.20 per kg of wet lump from their tasks (an example rate, above the minimum wage at the volumes shown): 150 kg a fortnight earns GH¢330, less any advance recovered. Keep each tapper's name, weight, rate, advance recovered, net pay and signature.

A sample cash book (March 2027, example)

The contractor has four hired tappers and taps one share himself. Each of the five tappers looks after 1,200 trees (three tasks of 400 on a three-day cycle), so the team covers 6,000 trees on 12 hectares and delivers about 1,500 kg of wet lump a month across Farms A, B and C. The team receives half the crop value and pays the hired tappers GH¢2.20 per kg for their share of the weight.

Closing balance = 8,425.00 − 5,580.00 = GH¢2,845.00.

Month-end routine

1. Add the cash book. Count the cash tin and read the MoMo and bank balances. They must equal the closing balance. Example: tin 645 + MoMo 2,200 = 2,845.
2. Reconcile MoMo. Compare your book with the MoMo statement. Example: the statement says 2,185 and the book says 2,200. The GH¢15 difference is unrecorded transaction charges: write them in the book and the two now agree. Do the same with the bank.
3. A trial-style check of your cash. Opening cash 1,200 + cash profit 3,345 (profit before depreciation, below) − drawings 1,500 − advance to a tapper 200 = 2,845. If this does not match the cash book, find the missing entry. (A trial balance is only a partial check: it can still hide a mistake that is on both sides, so keep the receipts too.)
4. Check the weigh slips against the cash book: every receipt for a delivery should match a slip.
5. Chase debtors, plan payments to creditors, and recover advances.
6. Draw up the profit statement and balance sheet, then write next month's cash plan.

Profit statement (March 2027, example)

Income minus the cost of making it is gross profit; take off the other costs for net profit. Drawings of GH¢1,500 are not a cost: they come out of the profit. The advance of GH¢200 is not a cost either: it is money owed to you.

Depreciation (straight line)

Straight-line depreciation = (cost − resale value) ÷ years of life. Motorbike GH¢14,400, no resale value assumed, 5 years: 2,880 a year, GH¢240 a month. Tools and scale GH¢2,400 over 4 years: 600 a year, GH¢50 a month. Together GH¢290 a month. Rain guards last a year and are written off as a cost when used.

Balance sheet (31 March 2027, example)

Assets equal liabilities plus equity.

Costing, margin, mark-up and break-even

• Margin = profit ÷ selling price. Mark-up = profit ÷ cost. They are different: a 28% margin is a 39% mark-up.
• Break-even = fixed costs ÷ profit per unit.

Example 1, a service line: rain-guard fitting for Farm A charged GH¢250 with materials of GH¢180. Profit 70. Margin = 70 ÷ 250 = 28%. Mark-up = 70 ÷ 180 = about 39%.

Example 2, the tapping business per kilogram: with a 50% team share, the contractor receives GH¢4.65 per kg (9.30 × 50%) and pays hired tappers GH¢2.20 on four-fifths of the weight, which is GH¢1.76 per kg across all the lump. Contribution per kg = 4.65 − 1.76 = GH¢2.89. Fixed monthly costs (overheads 1,060 + depreciation 290) are GH¢1,350. Break-even = 1,350 ÷ 2.89 = about 467 kg a month, which is about 31% of the 1,500 kg delivered. To also earn drawings of GH¢1,500: (1,350 + 1,500) ÷ 2.89 = about 986 kg. If the price falls to GH¢8.00: the share is 4.00, contribution 4.00 − 1.76 = 2.24, and break-even = 1,350 ÷ 2.24 = about 603 kg.

(Break-even and contribution are not new ideas: the formula is the one in the source above. The figures are our example.)

Cash flow across immature and mature years

A plantation owner's cash goes out for six years before it comes in. Look at one hectare. The following figures are examples only: year 1 costs GH¢12,000; years 2 to 6 cost GH¢4,000 each for upkeep; tapping starts in year 7; the hectare then gives 1,500 kg of wet lump a year at GH¢9.30, which is GH¢13,950; half goes to the tapper (GH¢6,975); upkeep of GH¢2,500 a year continues.

The hectare pays back its cost in year 14 in this example, 8 years after tapping starts. In your own books, record the establishment costs as "plantation under development", an asset that you build up, not as ordinary yearly expenses, so your profit statement is not wrongly negative for six years. How to treat these costs for tax was not verified: ask an accountant. Tapping and collection was 61% of the cost of producing rubber on Malaysian plantations, so the tapper's share is the biggest running cost once tapping starts.

If you borrow to plant and the interest is added during the grace period, the loan grows: GH¢20,000 at an example rate of 15% a year, added to the loan each year for 6 years, becomes 20,000 × 1.15⁶ = about GH¢46,261. That is why the evaluation found that interest added during the grace period raised the loan capital significantly. Ask your lender whether interest is added, paid, or waived in the grace period.

Cash-flow forecast (12 months)

A forecast lists expected receipts and payments each month so you see cash shortages ahead. For a tapper-based business, build it from kilograms: expected kg × price × share, less pay per kg, less fixed costs, drawings and loan payments. Rest months in the dry season have fewer or no kilograms but the same fixed costs. You do a full 12-month forecast in Unit 7.

Tax and employee records

• Modified Taxation Scheme (example): turnover of GH¢86,700 a year (7,225 × 12) is in the GH¢20,001 to 750,000 band, so 3% of turnover is GH¢2,601. Whether your turnover is your share or the full crop value, and whether you qualify, depends on your arrangement: ask the GRA. Partners and owners of several businesses are excluded.
• Withholding tax: a payer may be required to deduct withholding tax (for services 7.5%, for goods 3%, for works 5%, to be paid within 15 days after month-end). Whether this applies to payments from a farm owner to a small contractor was not verified: ask the GRA.
• VAT: below the thresholds you do not register (Unit 5). Keep records anyway.
• Employees: SSNIT 5.5% from the employee and 13% from the employer of basic pay. PAYE bands for 2026 are, per month: the first GH¢588 at 0%, the next 80 at 5%, the next 100 at 10%, the next 2,900 at 17.5%, and so on up; deduct SSNIT first; pay by the 15th of the next month; casual workers 5%. The GRA page says the annual table took effect on 1 September 2026: confirm. Example for one employee on GH¢1,200 basic: SSNIT 5.5% = 66; taxable pay 1,134; PAYE = 0 on the first 588, 4.00 on the next 80, 10.00 on the next 100, and 17.5% of the remaining 366 = 64.05, so PAYE is GH¢78.05; net pay = 1,200 − 66 − 78.05 = GH¢1,055.95; the employer adds 13% = GH¢156, so the cost to the employer is GH¢1,356.
• Records: keep them for at least six years.

Competency standard

Range. The trainee's own or team business plan. Evidence. Quality checklist; pricing sheet; growth plan; loan file list; one-page plan and forecast; panel observation.

Quality systems and customer care

Write a one-page routine for each task: the dawn briefing, tapping and inspection, stimulant day, lump handling and weighing, settlement, health scouting and the monthly report. A system means that if you are sick, someone else can do the job the same way. Add checklists: PPE and first aid; the weekly inspection sheet; the pre-delivery lump check; the cash proof. Keep the farm maps, delivery logs and weigh slips for every farm so that rubber can be traced from tree to buyer (Unit 4).

Look after the owner as a customer. Send a short monthly report: trees tapped, kilograms, price and value, bark use, dryness percentage, problems found and fixed, next month's plan, with photos of one or two panels. Answer questions within a day, keep a complaints book, and tell the owner bad news yourself and early. A farmer who trusts you will hand you more trees; the Level 2 advice stands: references and word of mouth bring the work.

Pricing strategy

Your price is your share ratio or fee. Set it in three steps: (1) your cost per kilogram or per hectare (Unit 6); (2) the margin you need; (3) what the market and the owner can bear. A small gap between your price and your cost leaves you with no reserve for the rest months. Do not win a farm by cutting the share so low that tappers must over-tap; poor tapping harms the owner and your name (Unit 1).

• Test your price against a fall. At GH¢9.30 the sample contractor breaks even at about 467 kg a month; at GH¢8.00 it needs about 603 kg (Unit 6).
• Charge for services separately: rain-guard fitting, knife sharpening, scouting reports, record keeping, immature block care, each priced from cost plus margin and checked against what neighbours charge.
• Review once a year with each owner, with the records on the table.

Scale in safe steps

Add one block at a time (for example another 12 hectares and five tappers), and only when all of these are true:

If the g/t/t, the dryness percentage or the quality scores get worse after you grow, stop and fix them before adding anything. A span of about eight tappers to one checker is a sensible starting rule (our suggestion).

Contracts, partners and tenders

Use a written agreement for every farm (Level 2): the farm and trees; the system; the share or fee; who pays for cups, knives, stimulant and transport; payment dates; weigh slips; wet-day rules; the quality standard; and how disputes are solved. Possible partners: other contractors (to share a scale, a bike or relief tappers), a farmers' group (Unit 4), an input shop, and GREL's outgrower unit, which provides technical assistance to outgrowers. For larger estate or institutional tapping contracts and public tenders, the rules and registration were not verified: ask the Assembly, the TCDA or the Public Procurement Authority.

Records for loans

A lender wants proof. Assemble a loan file: your registration papers and TIN; 12 months of cash book and MoMo or bank statements; monthly profit statements and the latest balance sheet; weigh slips and settlement statements; written agreements with owners; the farm list with hectares and trees; the 12-month forecast; and tax receipts. Keep records in Ghana for at least six years. Before signing: the interest rate and how it is charged, any fees, the grace period, whether unpaid interest is added to the loan, the repayment dates, and the collateral. Lenders must be licensed, and you should never pay an advance fee (Unit 5).

Succession and ethics

Write down who runs the business if you are ill: a trained deputy, the place where records and keys are kept, owner and buyer contacts, and what must happen in the first week. Train at least one apprentice to take over parts of the work.

Ethics are a business asset. The rules that keep your name clean:

• Honest scales and written weigh slips; no stones, sticks, water or sand in lump.
• No over-tapping for quick pay; tell the owner when a tree needs rest.
• Pay people on time and in full; keep to the minimum wage when you pay by the day (Unit 1).
• No child labour: tappers are 18 or over.
• Never buy lump of unknown origin or help an owner side-sell to avoid a loan (Unit 4).
• Never buy or sell anything from land taken by illegal mining.
• Protect the plantation: fire belts, no stray fires, and report intruders safely.

Rubber against galamsey. Illegal mining has destroyed rubber land: GREL said it was stopped from reaching parts of its plantation and might lay off 600 staff; over 19,000 trees on 40 hectares in Ahanta West were destroyed in one case; and GREL recorded 175 galamsey cases on its land in 2025. A skilled tapper or contractor earns every week from living trees, year after year (Level 1). Your business can be an alternative livelihood for others: train and employ young people, pay them fairly and teach them the rules. About 9,500 farmers have planted rubber with GREL's help, and a company planned to train 3,500 farmers as tappers. The Rubber Farmers Association of Ghana (RUFAG) says the sector uses about 300,000 tappers, a claim that was not checked, and farmers in Ahanta West named labour cost as their main production problem. Skilled, honest tappers are needed.

Risks to plan for

The one-page business plan

Use the eight headings in Unit 5, with these additions:

1. A block has 12,000 trees, tasks of 400 trees and an S/2 d3 system. How many tappers (before relief tappers)?
2. Why do you inspect more where tappers are paid by weight?
3. By law, how soon must an employer report an occupational accident, and under which Act?
4. Who decides to start intensification or controlled upward tapping?
5. A task of 400 trees gives 12 kg of wet lump on one tapping day. What is the g/t/t wet?
6. In which years of tapping is panel C (BI-1) used, and what bark is it?
7. Give three checks before anyone treats a block with a fungicide.
8. From what date may only certified seedlings be distributed for rubber?
9. What is DRC, and what DRC was the January 2023 minimum price based on?
10. Why did side-selling hurt the outgrower loans?
11. Rain-guard fitting is sold for GH¢250 and the materials cost GH¢180. What are the margin and the mark-up?
12. Someone offers to arrange your loan for an advance GH¢600 fee. What do you do?

Best next reads: GREL's outgrower unit and the TCDA zonal office for Ghana clones, doses and rules; the Rubber Research Institute of Sri Lanka's guides on tapping, fertilizer and budwood nurseries; the AFD evaluation of the Rubber Outgrower Plantation Project; the Labour Act, 2003; and the GRA pages on Modified Taxation, VAT and PAYE.

What this module does not cover: Ghana clone lists and tapping systems by clone; Ghana doses for fertilizer, stimulant and fungicide, and which products are registered for rubber (ask the EPA and GREL); Ghana tapper pay rates and farm cost data; TCDA licence, registration and conveyance fees; the farm-gate grading standard for cup lump; the tax treatment of farm income and plantation costs; the Department of Co-operatives route; EU deforestation rules in detail; and public tender rules. These are unverified and need a phone call or visit.

Every source used in this manual is listed, with links, in the Teacher Copy.