As part of its overall support to the Africa
Rice Center’s Emergency Rice Initiative in response to the world food crisis,
Japan is providing significant support to carry out activities in two
major areas:
- Enhanced access to quality seed of improved rice
varieties in selected
countries in sub-Saharan Africa in 20 out of 21 Coalition for African Rice Development (CARD) candidate
countries;
- Collection of reliable rice data in all 21 CARD
countries to support the development and implementation of national rice
development strategies.
The 21 CARD countries
comprise Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Cameroon, Liberia, Mauritania,
Senegal, Mali, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Togo in West Africa and
Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda,
Zambia in East Africa.
The project works in close collaboration with
national research and extension systems and the private sector in the target countries.
For the seed component
of this project, the West Africa regional launching meeting, followed by a
training workshop, was organized in Cotonou, Benin, 27 April-1 May. The East
Africa launching meeting and training workshop took place in Dar Es Salaam,
Tanzania, 4-8 May.
For the rice statistics
component of this project, the West Africa regional launching meeting, followed
by a training workshop, was organized in Cotonou, Benin, 11-15 May and the East
Africa launching and training took place in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, 1-5 June.
The project is using the Emergency Rice
Initiative Spreadsheet (ERIS) that has been developed by the Africa Rice Center
to assist African countries in developing strategies to boost domestic rice
production.