By: Haruna Kuyateh
The women rice growers in Niumi Jurungu in the North Bank Region (NBR) have launched an appeal to the government of The Gambia and like-minded organizations to support the community with tractors and threshers.
This appeal was made on Tuesday as the regional steering committee of the Resilience Of Organisation for Transformative Smallholder Agriculture Project (ROOTS) conducted a day-long project site visits to Jurunku, Bakang Karantaba, Salikene and Yallal Tankonjala.
Jurungu is currently targeting to cultivate 80 hectares of ricefield and already 77.58 hectares of the field was ploughed. ROOTS has given the community 320 bags of NPK fertilizer, 160 bags of Urea and 80 bags of paddy rice.
Bakang Karantaba cluster on the other hand targets to plough 55 hectares and 32.84 of this was already ploughed. Roots supported the cluster with 220 bags of NPK fertilizer, 110 bags of Urea and 55 bags of rice.
Salikene meanwhile received 240 bags of NPK and 120 bags of Urea fertilizer as well as 60 bags of rice as the community targets to plough 60 hectares with 25.94 of this already ploughed.
Kinteh Kunda Janneh Ya meanwhile is targeting to plough 50 hectares and 34 hectares have already been ploughed. ROOTS also gave the community 2000 bags of NPK, 100 bags of Urea and 50 bags of rice.
The regional project is targeting 746 beneficiaries.
Speaking during the visit, the Deputy Governor of NBR, Dembo Samateh, underscored the government’scommitment to food production and applauded ROOTS forthe rice and vegetable inputs to support in attaining household food and nutrition security.
He said the visits would greatly promote shared learning and help ROOTS learn about challenges first-hand.
Lady President and ROOTS’ Focal Person for Jurunku, Fatou Darboe, thanked ROOTS for the foresight, notingthat the support would contribute to boosting rice production and strengthening food security.
She described the support as historic in terms of inputs.
The inputs subsidy support programme is a three-year contract with ROOTS and is subject to performance and compliance review.
Women rice farmers capitalized on the visits to appeal for more support in the form of rice threshers, planters and tractors.
The Regional Coordinator of ROOTS, Demba Sanyang,said the project is aimed at strengthening farmer-based organisations to enable them to take up ownership of their development projects for sustainability, noting that the visits by RSC were of paramount importance to the project’s implementation. He added that ROOTS aims to strengthen farmers’ capacity to increase rice production and to support them in venturing into marketing their excess harvests for income diversification.
Mamud Gaina from the Regional Agricultural Directorate in Kerewan cum the current chair of RSC reiterated the need for a concerted effort to harness the potential of farmers to boost food production.
He thanked ROOTS for its collaboration, oversight roleand provision of technical guidance.