A flagship program on sustainable agriculture being implemented by IITA is helping Liberia get its cocoa industry back on track.
Through the Sustainable Tree Crops Program (STCP), IITA and its partners are re-energizing Liberia’s cocoa sector by building the capacity of farmers and providing them with high-quality planting materials. The program also takes an active role in combating child labor, improving health and working conditions, and introducing environmentally sustainable farming methods in cocoa-producing communities. The STCP in Liberia covers the counties of Nimba, Bong and Lofa.
The country’s civil war of 1989-2003 decimated the country’s transportation and storage infrastructures and left most of the farml ands fallow for the most part. Cocoa production – second to rubber as the country’s chief agricultural export – suffered a major blow, shrinking by more than 50 percent and most of the cocoa produced smuggled and sold into neighboring countries.
Industry experts estimate that improving cocoa production would benefit some 30 000 farm families, or 150 000 of Liberia’s 3.1 million people. And in a country where unemployment is more than 70 percent of the working population, the re-introduction of cocoa as a second cash crop is seen as an opportunity for increasing employment and for increasing foreign exchange earnings.
According to STCP-Liberia Program Manager Mr. MacArthur Pay-Bayee, “Since its inception in 2006, the program has directly trained almost 7000 farmers on integrated crop pests and quality management (ICPQM) and responsible social behavior (HIV/AIDS, farm safety and child labor) through the farmers’ field schools (FFS) methodology. This year, nearly 2000 farmers in Bong, Lofa and Nimba counties are enrolled in STCP’s FFS”.
He adds, “Farmers enrolled in FFS, in turn, must train three others in their communities through farmer-to-farmer diffusion. This multiplies the program’s benefits and impact three-fold”. Pay-Bayee also said that STCP is providing the Liberian Ministry of Agriculture technical inputs for the development of a national training curriculum on cocoa agro-forestry and palm culture.
Aside from training, farmers receive seedlings of improved cocoa varieties. Graduates of the nine-month FFS in 2006 got improved varieties from the Centre National de Recherché Agronomique (CNRA) based in neighboring Cote d’Ivoire. STCP-Liberia collaborates with CNRA and facilitates the transfer of its varieties to farmer-beneficiaries. Graduates of 2007 and potential graduates of 2008 will receive planting materials from the Cocoa Research Institute of Ghana (CRIG).
The farmers harden the improved cocoa seedlings in community-managed nurseries established by the program and distribute them to other farmers. According to Pay-Bayee, this exemplifies and highlights the benefits of public-private partnership. The cocoa varieties obtained by STCP from CNRA and those coming from CRIG are high-yielding, disease-resistant and early-maturing – producing fruits within three years if the recommended agronomic practices are followed.
Through talks with the Central Agricultural Research Institute (CARI), STCP-Liberia has also ensured the establishment of a cocoa seedling nursery to be used as budded stumps for cocoa clones to be imported for the establishment of a seed garden within the institute’s premises near Suakoko, Bong County. This partnership will help guarantee the steady supply of high-quality planting materials to cocoa farmers and enable the national research center to meet the planting material needs of Liberian cocoa farmers.
The program has also been actively engaged in supporting the Ministry of Agriculture in developing strategies on production, marketing and extension, through the conduct of roundtable meetings and workshops with farmers, international experts and other stakeholders.
Pay-Bayee adds that aside from these topics, STCP-Liberia also conducts training workshops on strengthening farmers’ organizations and cooperative development, intending to enhance the capability existing rudimentary and internecine farmers’ organizations and rehabilitate the Cooperative Development Agency (CDA) and upgrading of the Cooperative Laws.
Besides cocoa, STCP-Liberia has also diversified into the country’s rubber and oil palm sectors, recently completing feasibility studies on these high-value commodities. The Ministry of Agriculture had requested STCP-Liberia to develop and implement a National Rubber Master Plan based on the findings of these studies.
Currently, STCP-Liberia is supported by USAID, the World Bank, ACDI/VOCA and the World Cocoa Foundation and industry through its regional core program.
The program collaborates with a number of International and national partners, including SOCODEVI, ACDI/VOCA (LIFE Project), Africa 2000 Network Liberia, the Lofa Educational and Agricultural Foundation, the Integrated Rural Development Organization and the Central Agriculture Research Institute CARI. Other support bases include the Ministry of Agriculture and the Liberian Senates Committee on Agriculture.
Contributed by
Related news