Dear All,
I am Aminata F Kandeh from Sierra Leone thanks to these who have contributed to the different topic in this forum. Am so delighted to be part of this forum am learning a lot , I will like to give my own contribution on question four which says What interventions do you think are needed to increase the agriculture sector resilience to environmental stressors, especially among smallholder farmers? In my country we have not yet embark on commercial farming although we have some people in to it but the percentage is not compared to those that are not. Am sure the major problem is with the government they should provide the enable environment for us such as good road network, electricity and many more. Also the agricultural sector should provide the necessary input and equipment for the farmers, for example machines, Seeds and other farm input at very reasonable price so that the farmers will be able to plant and on time.
I will want the government to pay more attention to agriculture because it is the way out for the development of my country we are blessed with so many raw materials, minerals and the climate condition is ok. In addition they need to encourage investors in the field to invest in the country by reducing the level of taxes on them and also make sure that they sign an agreement that whatever raw materials they produce in the country should be as well processed here.
Furthermore, most of the students that studied agriculture do not want to go to the field because we are not encouraged as those that studied accounting, information Technology and the likes. Majority of the youth in my country see farming as poor man job and most of them are living in the city, the stakeholders need to make the field very attractive one like the others and also provide basic facilities such as pipe burn water, electricity, health centers and the likes in all the districts by so doing we will have more youth going in to farming. This is my humble contribution thanks for reading.
Ms. Aminata Fatmata Kandeh