Senegalese Farmers Now Buying Less Rice

Yields barely lasted three months for rice-producing households of Ngoungoul, a village located about 250 Kilometers to the South of the capital, Dakar.

The conventional rice cultivation methods did not only require more water, seeds, and fertilizers, the harvest often fell short of expectation.

In Senegal as in most part of West Africa, rice is a major staple. Meaning, when yields are low, households have to resort mostly to imported rice to make up for the deficit. For families mostly living on less than USD 2 per day, this places considerable stress on already slender financial resources.

But since the introduction of the system for rice intensification (SRI), an innovative and environmentally-friendly cultivation method, rice growers in this unusually forested Senegalese village are having some respite. Not only have yields doubled, but farmers are also using fewer inputs. Early adopters of SRI in Ngoungoul have experienced an increase in production, freeing farmers to use their limited incomes on other household priorities.