LIBERIA/NIGERIA: Liberia’s Rice Revolution: Experts Say a Proven Model Offers Hope to Break Dependence on Imports and Reduce Hunger

Liberia is slowly adopting what experts say is a proven rice farming method that could reduce its dependence on imports. The program known as “System of Rice Intensification” (SRI) has been used successfully in other countries to increase rice yields. Now a coalition of farmers, policymakers, and international partners plans to scale it up here. “Every time you eat imported rice, you are importing poverty, and you are exporting your wealth,” said Robert Bimba who is widely regarded as the pioneer of System of Rice Intensification in Liberia. A consensus is emerging: the techniques exist, and the early results are real. Experts say Liberia’s rice revolution now depends on investment and political will and that SRI is already delivering sharply higher yields in Liberia’s fields and has been proven at scale in places like northern Nigeria. In April at the in-country launch of the Global Hunger Index in Liberia, Umar Namadi, the governor of Jigawa State in Nigeria, where the technology helped lift rice yields from a national embarrassment to a continental benchmark, was present to share a blueprint. He said his state had embraced the SRI not as a donor project but as economic policy that, importantly, engaged private business.

Read More: https://fpa.news/liberias-rice-revolution-experts-say-a-proven-model-offers-hope-to-break-dependence-on-imports-and-reduce-hunger/