Rice Policy Challenges and Constraints for Liberia:

Food Security for Small-holders and rice value chain development

Eric Wailes, ProfessorUniversity of Arkansas, Fayetteville

Division of Agriculture

Overview of presentation

• Two economies of the Liberian rice sector

• Constraints and Challenges

• National Rice Development Strategy

• The Path Forward – institution building, infrastructure development and value-chain enhancements.

Two Rice Economies of Liberia

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60% dependence on imports Development and rehabilitation of the domestic rice sector

Liberia Rice Production, Supply, Use and Trade

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2006/07 2007/08 2008/09 2009/1012010/11 2011/12 2012/13

Area Harvested 130 160 190 200 200 200 200

Yield 0.78 0.71 0.95 0.93 0.94 0.95 0.96

Production 101 113 181 185 187 189 191Beginning Stocks 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Domestic Supply 101 113 181 185 187 189 191

Consumption 311 253 331 385 402 409 426Ending Stocks 0 0 0 0 0 0 16 Domestic Use 311 253 331 385 402 409 443

Net Trade -210 -140 -150 -200 -215 -220 -251Import Share 68% 55% 45% 52% 53% 54% 59%Source: USDA, PS&D

Thousand Hectares

Metric tons/ha (milled)

Thousand metric tons (milled)

Key Constraints and ChallengesValue Chain Constraints

Lack of Certified Seed Production System

Limited credit and microfinance

Limited private sector for input marketing and rice milling and

marketing

Institutional Constraints

Limited adaptive research capacity at

CARI

Lack of Extension and Training Programs

Inadequate information on farm-

level constraints, costs and productivity

Infrastructure Constraints

Inadequate feeder road network

Damaged and Undeveloped Irrigation

Systems

Lack of farm machinery,

drying/storage, milling facilities

National Rice Development StrategyLiberia Agriculture Sector

Investment Program (LASIP)

Food and Nutrition Security

Competitive Value Chains and Market

Linkages

Institutional Development

Land and Water

Development

Liberia National Rice Development Strategy (LNRDS)

Enhancing Access to

InputsMechanization

Enhancing Post-Harvest

Quality Improvement

Enhancing Access to Markets

Institutional Capacity Building

Land and Water

Development

Vision and Scope of LNRDSEcosystem Area

cultivated 2009 (Ha)

2018 projection

(Ha)

Production output (MT)

2009 20181-crop/yr

20181.5 crop/yr

Upland 190,000 190,000 171,000 380,000 380,000 Yield/ha 0.9 t/ha 2 t/ha Lowland Rain-fed 20,000 64,500 24,000 225,750 338,625

Yield/ha 1.2 t/ha 3.5 t/ha Lowland Irrigated 2,000 45,500 4,000 273,000 409,500

Yield/ha 2.0 t/ha 6 t/ha Total 212,000 300,000 199,000 878,750 1,128,125

Source: Ministry of Agriculture. 2011. National Rice Development Strategy. Table 2, p. 18.

Path Forward: Research and Extension Policy on Upland and Lowland Rice Systems

1. Farmer Association demonstration sites are developed for 2013 to provide a much-needed baseline data set on productivity and costs of production, to evaluate the strategy regarding on-going efforts towards the two production systems.

2. Measurement of practices, production and productivity for project farmers and a control group of non-participating farmers will provide on-going assessment of progress and constraints critical to analyze future strategy of rice value chain.

3. With regard to upland rice value chain:– What priority should be given to upland rice system improvement?– What is the extent to which upland rice needs to be understood as an integrated

cropping/livestock system? – What is the role of rice as a food subsistence component where more emphasis is

needed on diversification into vegetables and livestock as opportunities to improve household incomes and diets/nutrition?

– How to address this with respect to the global context, the environmental context, food security context and small-holder engagement.

Path Forward: Research and Extension Policy on Upland and Lowland Rice Systems

4. With regard to lowland rice value chain:4. What priority should be given to lowland rice system improvement?5. What are the economic returns to investment in development/ rehabilitation of lowland

rice areas? Can it be justified on rice alone?6. What is the extent to which lowland rice needs to be understood as an integrated

cropping/aquaculture system? 7. What is the role of lowland rice from a food security framework as a safeguard from

dependence on rice imports and volatility in global rice markets?8. How to address this with respect to the global context, the environmental context, food

security context and small-holder engagement.

5. Post-harvest processing and marketing: 4. The strategy to work with Farmer Associations to develop post-harvest processing

infrastructure has begun using a parboil approach.5. This is value-enhancing from both a milled rice recovery perspective and a nutrition

enhancing perspective.6. Basic questions remain on logistics and coordination of inputs (fuel, water, labor, drying and

storage of paddy, drying and storage of parboiled, and drying and storage of milled (brown or white rice) and use of by-products (hulls, bran and ash).

Recommendations

1. Develop business incubation models for Farmer Associations for value chain investments.

2. Develop cost-benefit analysis of improved seed and associated technology packages being promoted by MOA and FED/USAID.

3. Develop detailed study using AGREP models on impacts of pending trade negotiations with ECOWAS and WTO for Liberia rice to assess accession, staging and consequences for the rice sector.

Global Rice Framework – Arkansas Global Rice Economics Program (AGREP)

 Arkansas Global Rice Model AGRM is one of the two global rice modeling frameworks maintained by the University of Arkansas’ Global Rice Economics Program (AGREP). AGRM is a partial, non-spatial, multi-country statistical simulation and econometric analytical framework.

RICEFLOW, is a spatial equilibrium framework that tracks bilateral trade flows and rice value chain adjustments for flexible product disaggregation of rice and other commodities and disaggregation of countries and regions.

These models are updated on a regular basis to provide situation and outlook projections and are being used to provide analyses for the World Bank, IRRI, USDA, OECD, Asian Development Bank, United Nations-FAO, Africa Rice Center as well as many national governments and research institutes. These models link all countries through rice prices and trade (Wailes, 2012).

African countries and regions currently modeled include: Cameroon, Cote D’Ivoire, Egypt, Ghana, Guinea, Kenya, Liberia, Mali, Mozambique, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Tanzania, ECOWAS-7, and Rest-of Africa

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