Dear Editor,
Groundnut farming on which nearly all farmers in The Gambia rely on has largely failed this year and the consequences are severe for the very poor farmers who rely on a single income of a few hundred dollars for the whole year. One of the worst hit area is my native Sami where nearly all the groundnut farms have failed. I worked with more than a dozen women groups as well as individuals and community groups to cultivate groundnuts across Sami and every single one of those failed despite adequate input of seeds, tractor ploughing and fertilizer.
The reasons are the following according to agriculture extension workers I engaged throughout the process: 1. Rains upon which the farmers rely came two months late. Farmers I worked with started planting after July 18 when in previous years planting stopped latest by July 15. Meaning the entire normal planting period was lost in the catastrophic two month delay. Farmers had no choice but to plant despite the unprecedented delay.
2. The average rainfall for the entire rainy season for the country in a normal year is 800mm according to the extension officers we worked with but Sami got only 500mm this year which came two months late. The combination of the delay and the inadequacy in the volume of rainfall resulted in the peanuts not having enough time and rainfall to mature normally.
Fertiliser application cannot make up for the natural disaster. All farms failed and produced less than 5% percent of the anticipated yields leaving folks with next to nothing. One of the women told me how she borrowed D2,000 from a microfinance company in June to tie her over during the lean and difficult months of July and August hoping to repay the loan in this January. But she can’t pay because she earned nothing. She decided to travel from the village she was married at to go to her parents village hoping the parents farm fared better but their farm failed too. So she has no way of paying back the loan because she could not even earn the equivalent of less than US$30 for the whole year!
When the rainy season fails, it traps the poorest of our citizens into even deeper poverty. They earn no money, they won’t have seeds to save for the following rainy season, most of them have no one in the diaspora to occasionally help them and they have very little capacity to borrow money. What are they going to do to get by? Very difficult to manage everyday living.
My biggest worry is how difficulty in getting seeds and fertiliser for next rainy season will compound their problem because the limited seeds that would be available would be priced out the range of most of them. I am urging the government to recognise the plight the farmers find themselves in and declare an emergency. Delayed and inadequate rains are outside of government control but addressing the devastating consequences it has on our poor farmers is an urgent duty they have. Farmers whose crops have failed must not be abandoned to their fate. I am suggesting the government consider doing the following as a matter of urgency: 1. Declare an agriculture emergency and conduct an urgent and thorough assessment of the scale of crop failure across the country.
2. Have the regional agriculture offices work directly with local councils and village development committees to accurately establish the scale of the disaster and the actual number of people affected.
3. Begin immediately to research and procure good quality groundnut seeds overseas that is suitable for our land for the coming rainy season .
4. Identify the most vulnerable among the farmers facing this crop failure and provide emergency assistance that can tie them over till the next rainy season is over. That would be a six month aid package of about US$50 per month per family of four and above and US$30 for families of under four. I pray for Allah the merciful and the beneficent to bless our people in their time of difficulty.
Karamba Touray
USA
