In a bid to help transform the Agricultural sector as a way of improving and promoting productivity in local produce and the lives of farmers in the country, the Forum of Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) yesterday met with the Minister of Agriculture and other stakeholders at the Ministry conference hall fifth floor Youyi Building.
The meeting attracted stakeholders from the Private Sector, mining companies, Commercial Banks and the purpose of the meeting according to Prof. Monty P. Jones, Executive Director of FARA, involves two things of which the first is to bring together these stakeholders so that they could try to establish an Innovation Fund for agricultural transformation in Sierra Leone, “and basically the idea is the fact that in the agricultural development sector there have been a widening gap between the farmers and the private sector,” he said.
He explained that the private sector is not investing as much as they should in agricultural programmes and the idea is to create this fund so that it will be made available to private sector groups so that they can invest in agricultural activities in Sierra Leone.
“We hope to improve the agricultural sector and also improve the farming relationship between the private sector and the farmers to promote agricultural development,” he added.
Prof. Jones disclosed that they will concentrate on rice and cassava production and that they will also look into nutrition not only food security as they will have to include fishery and poultry to have a balanced diet.
He stated that there is a time frame for countries to attain the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which is 2015, and there are two relevant MDGs that concern agriculture – that is MDG one that has to do with Poverty to be eradicated by the year 2015 and MDG two that deals with environmental analysis and sustainable agricultural activities under our different environments.
“If you look at the status of Africa today with regards to the MDGs, there are very few countries that are projected to attain the MDGs in 2015 of which Ghana is one of them, and I am hoping that with the revolution that we are going to create through the adoption of what we call the Innovation of systems for agricultural development for technology generation and adoption,” he maintained Sierra Leone too will be in line to attain the MDGs.
He explained further that they are hoping that Sierra Leone will be among the few countries that will attain the MDGs before 2015 as Ghana has attained MDG one as they are presently classed as a middle income earning country which is making considerable progress in agricultural development.
According to him the implementation of the Agricultural Business Centers around the country by the government is a very good initiative in improving agriculture and transforming the lives of farmers by exposing them to the use of modern technology, adding that if this new initiative is endorsed then Sierra Leone will be food self sufficient and start exporting again.
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