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Sierra Leone is slowly recovering from the impacts of a protracted civil war which raged between 1991 and 2002, and in which an estimated 50,000 people were killed. In 2007, Sierra Leone was ranked 180 out of 182 countries in the UN Human Development Index (HDI); 70% of the population lived below the poverty line and 26% in extreme poverty. Life expectancy is currently at 41 years, the eighth lowest in the world. Maternal and child mortality rates are the highest in the world.
Agriculture, forestry and fishery contribute for about 52.5% of GDP, and support the livelihoods of 75% of the population;about two-thirds of the population engages in subsistence agriculture. In the past, Sierra Leone was a major exporter of various agricultural commodities, including cocoa, coffee, ginger, palm kernels, and rubber. The period of civil war forced many people to leave their farm holdings unattended; the displacement of about 500,000 farming families led to a steep decrease in agricultural production by more than 30% from pre-conflict levels. The cocoa and coffee sub-sectors, which used to be cornerstones of the agriculture sector of Sierra Leone, were left in shambles by the conflict.
Since then, most farmers have returned to their plots; food production has increased strongly. The agriculture sector has significant potential for sustained economic growth and job creation throughout the country, taking over from diamond, rutile and bauxite mining. In 2006, rice and cassava production was double the pre-conflict level (Figure 2). Despite this positive development, the figure also shows that the cocoa and coffee sub-sectors are still a long way from their former state of development, as the existing structures and knowledge were lost during the war and post-conflict period. While exports of cocoa have been increasing from 2006 to 2010 as the crop recovers from the years of conflict, exports dropped again in 2011 and 2012. Coffee exports remain insignificant. Cashew production has never had the importance of cocoa and coffee and major challenges exist in providing production incentives at different levels. No cashew exports are reported, the sub-sector is characterized by low production volumes, variable and fragmented supply and a monopolistic set-up
Although 75% of the country’s total land area is suitable for agricultural production, only 15% is actually cultivated. Of this cultivated area, only 20% is devoted to cash crop production, this is only 2.5% of the total arable land. Government policy now aims to restore and strengthen the countries value chains, bringing abandoned areas back into production, increasing local earnings within the value chain and strengthening the access to international markets.
The targeted sub-sectors need considerable assistance to strengthen production capacity, decrease transaction costs, update outdated legislation and regulations, harmonise production standards and export conditions and to improve problems of warehousing and port facilities. Information systems and commodity associations are very weakly developed.
To address these issues and to further improve the development of these important commodity sub-sectors, the European Union is financing the ‘Agriculture for Development’ (A4D) Programme under the 10th EDF. A4D is designed as a programme with a three-and-a-half-year duration, and applies the value chain approach to help rejuvenate the value chains for traditional export crops cocoa and coffee and by diversifying the tree crop sector by promoting cashew production, by:
improving the quantity and quality of tree cash-crop production for coffee, cocoa and cashew;
reducing transaction costs;
Maximizing efficiency and effectiveness of the value chains; and
Increasing profitability at all levels.
Primary beneficiaries of the Programme are the smallholder farmers producing cocoa and coffee within the three districts of Kenema, Kailahun and Kono in the Eastern Province; and cashew in the three districts of Kambia, Port Loko and Bombali in the Northern Province. The consortium AFC/GOPA started implementation in early May 2012; the programme has just completed its first year of operation.
Services are provided to ensure technical, administrative and financial management of the project in conformity with EDF administrative, legal and financial procedures. This includes assistance in the preparation, management and implementation of annual Programme Estimates as direct labour operations, including the operation of the Project Coordination Unit (PCU). Since the overall programme includes a large grant scheme to finance field activities to improve the three sub-sectors, the team has developed terms of reference for supplies and services tenders as well as calls for proposals, participate in the evaluation of the bids, supervise and monitor the performance of the contract implementation. As the grant contracts have now been awarded, the next step will be to assist and strengthen the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Food Security (MAFFS) in the follow-up of the grant contracts and other implemented contracts according to the delegation given by the National Authorizing Office (NAO).
As functioning information systems are lacking, the team also assists in the set-up of information and monitoring & evaluation systems at different levels. At present, an extensive and detailed baseline survey is carried out in all six intervention districts.
Within the sector, gap analysis is being carried out along the value chain and within involved institutions, to identify bottlenecks and design appropriate measures to address these through the development of sector strategies, research, information management, provision of training and improvement of extension services, and through private sector support activities. Capacity-building of the respective District Councils and other decentralised government offices is supported as well.
To create better framework conditions for private enterprises, a key activity of the TA is to review the existing legal and regulatory framework, to propose changes and amendments as needed and draft legislation to be presented to Parliament, in order to establish a modern framework in line with present day requirements.
In cooperation with the Sierra Leone Agriculture Research Institute (SLARI), a Memorandum of Understanding has been designed on the identification and import of improved vegetal materials (IVM), the rehabilitation or renewal of the existing research facilities, including clonal gardens for cocoa and coffee, as well as on some other short- and long-term research and demonstration activities.
The improvement of product quality at the different production, processing and handling stages is a key area of intervention. The A4D project supports the government in setting national quality objectives in the respective national commodity policies. A workshop on definition of updated quality standards and towards recommendations on a total quality management concept for the respective value chains will be held shortly, while more technical aspects of quality management, i.e. procedures and practices for SPS compliance and quality evaluation, have been identified and will be supported by capacity building measures in the near future.
Also currently on-going is a mission to support the improvement of port facilities and container handling, as the processes at port have been identified as a significant bottleneck to the export of agricultural commodities.
Sierra Leone lacks commodity associations for the cocoa, coffee and cashew sub-sectors. Such associations fulfil an important role as service providers to their members, to enable them to increase profitability and develop a better marketing position, as well as advocacy institutions representing the sub-sector in a dialog with the government, speaking with one voice instead of with many. Therefore, activities to support the establishment of commodity associations are being undertaken; a local Commodity Association expert has been identified and will take up her work shortly.
As the selected grant implementers are expected to take up their respective assignments at the start of the third quarter, implementation will gain further momentum during the coming months and will actively involve at least 100,000 beneficiaries in the different target districts.
For more information, please contact:
Johannes Geisen
Senior Consultant
Tel.: >GL3EEK3LK3HJ3LHJ
johannes.geisen [at] afci.de