(Business in Cameroon) - On September 25, in Yaoundé, Cameroon and the International Fund for Agricultural Development signed a XAF28.5 billion ($47 million) credit agreement for the 2^nd phase of the Commodity Value Chain Support Project (PADFA), which will span over 2020-2026.

The project will help boost the production of rice and onions in four regions in Cameroon. The regions are namely the North, the Far North, the North-West, and the South. According to Hélène Misse Marigoh, the national coordinator of the PADFA, starting from the third year of implementing the project (2023), it will help produce an additional 118,000 tons of paddy rice (for 80,000 tons of milled rice) every year.  

She explained that the additional production will reduce the current deficit by 10% and in the long term, it will help reduce the massive rice importation in Cameroon. Indeed, according to official sources, the country spends about XAF150 billion every year to import rice. In 2019, it spent a record XAF231 billion to import over 800,000 tons of rice, the national institute for statistics revealed recently.

Brice R. Mbodiam