By Ralph Sesay
Lawmakers in Sierra Leone have urged the New Direction Government to improve budgetary support to the Sierra Leone Agricultural Research Institute (SLARI) for it to be able to achieve the overall goal of the agricultural policy of sustainable and diversified production of food on a scale enough to feed the growing population as well as providing gainful employment.
The lawmakers made this appeal while posing questions to the SLARI Director General, Mr. Mathew Gboku, at the well of Parliament around the 2018 and 2019 Budget allocations to the institute as well as the overall activities of the institute towards improving on the country’s Agricultural sector.
The Sierra Leone Agricultural and Research Institute was created through an Act of Parliament, in 2007, as the country’s agricultural technology generating body for the benefit of farmers, fishing and forestry sectors.
The objective of SLARI is to enhance sustainable productivity, commercialization and competitiveness of the agricultural sector.
SLARI has been constrained, since its establishment, to secure enough budgetary support to conduct valuable research leading to the development of new varieties and innovations that will lead to increase in yields across the board.
Sierra Leone annual rice yields are recorded at 0.5 tonne per hectare and this has been attributed to the poor quality of seed grains in the country. The Institute was supposed, since creation, to have established seven research centers, but has only been able to create six, namely: Njala and Rokurp Research Centers, the Kabala Horticultural Crops Research Center, the Teko Livestock Research Center, the Magbosi Land and Water Research Center and the Kenema and Tree Crops Research Center.
Successive governments have not been able to use research as an engine that will propel the drive towards national food security and poverty alleviation.
In 2018 Government approved a budgetary allocation of Le2,642,400,000 and received the sum of Le13,352,777. This meager amount, according to SLARI, was expended on research activities, travel salaries and wages of office and general administrative cost.
In the 2019 Budget, SLARI submitted Le31,294,500 and received an allocation of Le5,152,611,500 and the reduction of this budgetary support, according to the Director General of SLARI, Mr. Mathew L.S. Gboku, will greatly hinder the implementation of research activities, establishment of new research centers, recruitment of essential staff and capacity building and purchase of equipment, among others.
It will be recalled that the new government has, in its campaign, placed a huge priority around diversification of the economy, using agriculture as an engine for economic growth.
Capacitating research into the entire agricultural sector will create a huge impact for new innovations into the sector, by supporting farmers who are largely caught up in old and traditional methods of farming and production, including also the use of olds seeds, which have largely been supportive of subsistence farming.
The Minister of Agriculture, Joseph Ndanema, has identified lack of quality seeds and research as critical to the overall agricultural transformation plan currently being hatched by the New Direction government, but allocating such a meager amount to SLARI does not resonate well with such good intentions.
Agriculture is a capital investment project and requires huge support, including that of the private sector, to be able to develop and contribute to the growth of the country.