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Photo: ©FAO
December 12, 2018, Aida, Ghana— The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the Africa Rice Organization and the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) have reaffirmed their commitment to supporting African countries in their efforts to achieve self-sufficiency in rice production.
Speaking at the opening of the African Rice Production Symposium, Abebe Haile Gabriel, FAO Assistant Director-General and Regional Representative for Africa, stressed the need for partners to work together to mainstream good practices into national rice investments and achieve sustainability.
“We are actively working with the African Rice Development Consortium (CARD), AfricaRice and the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) to incorporate best practices or lessons learned from project implementation. Our goal is to eventually disseminate this knowledge to countries to promote sustainable rice production,” Haile-Gabriel added.
He further noted that the partnership has already achieved some significant results, stressing that “it has contributed to improvements in seeds, post-harvest activities, irrigation and technology adoption in many African countries. FAO is optimistic that the promotion and adoption of best practices in the rice sector will help maintain the momentum towards rice self-sufficiency and create gainful employment opportunities for youth and women along the entire rice value chain.”
The theme of the two-day seminar held in Ada, Ghana was Scaling up partnerships for sustainable rice systems development in sub-Saharan Africa: Lessons from national projects and programmes on rice value chains, It provided a platform for brainstorming and technical contributions on how to mainstream best practices into national rice investment programmes.
Effective leadership and political will are essential to achieving rice self-sufficiency in Africa
Achieving rice self-sufficiency in Africa is not only strategic and significant in terms of meeting local consumption needs. It has a multiplier effect, which means reallocating much-needed foreign exchange to invest in rice value chain development initiatives. Such diversification will ultimately create and expand employment opportunities for youth and women. Rice production has already increased significantly in many countries over the past few years.
Peter Anadoumba, South-South Cooperation Officer at FAO’s Regional Office for Africa, said Tanzania is one of the few countries to have achieved self-sufficiency in rice production and no longer import rice. “This is a major development and definitely a landmark achievement,” he said.
“Moreover, through South-South cooperation, the project promotes new technologies and innovations in the rice value chain in Sub-Saharan Africa, which should be mainstreamed into future rice sector interventions,” he added.
“This encouraging success in increasing rice production is proof and proof that with effective leadership and political will and concerted efforts by all stakeholders, nothing can stop us from achieving rice self-sufficiency and the goal of ending hunger,” Anadoumba further said. “Despite this success, the fact remains that major challenges remain in achieving sustainable rice production,” he further acknowledged.
Rising import bills burden the region
Rice is the world’s most important staple food, and demand is expected to double, putting enormous pressure on rice production to meet the needs of a growing world population. This requires a 25% increase in rice production over the next 25 years.
More than half of Africa’s 43 rice-producing countries are also net rice importers, with import ratios ranging from 10% to 93%. Available data show that in 2015 alone, African countries imported about 36% of their rice needs, with imports exceeding US$4 billion.
Forecasts for 2020 show this trend continuing, but the concern is the increased consumption of foreign exchange to pay for rice imports, which is expected to increase by $7 billion per year.
The workshop provided further guidance to help scale up best practices in technology adoption, optimal farming practices, water management and post-harvest activities to national programmes, as well as private sector investment in the rice sector. All of which will contribute to achieving Africa’s rice transformation agenda.
About the Project
The Partnership for Sustainable Rice Systems Development in Sub-Saharan Africa is an ongoing FAO project that was approved in May 2014 for an initial period of 23 months, from February 2016 to December 2017.
With an additional year’s extension, the project will reach its current estimated completion date of December 2018. The project targets countries including Benin, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Guinea, Kenya, Mali, Nigeria, Senegal, Tanzania and Uganda.
Since the project was launched, 10 beneficiary countries have carried out Needs Identification ExerciseThis ensured that priorities were aligned during the project development and implementation phases. In addition, this approach led to some modifications during project implementation.
The project, which has been implemented in all 10 selected countries since September 2016, aims to support the scale-up of innovative practices such as rice intensification systems, rice processing and post-harvest management.
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