How the Ministry of Agriculture is trying to help farmers in Burkina Faso

This Thursday, August 6th, 2020 in Koudougou, the Ministry of Agriculture, in collaboration with the Insurance and Reinsurance Company (SONAR), initiated a sensitization workshop on the implementation of agricultural insurance in Burkina Faso. 

The objective of this meeting was to encourage agricultural stakeholders to adhere to the agricultural insurance mechanism in Burkina Faso. The pilot phase of this project focuses on maize production and concerns the Boucle du Mouhoun, Center-West and East regions.

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Agricultural insurance aims to protect producers against the risk of crop losses due to insufficient rainfall or drought

The Ministry of Agriculture has indeed committed itself to a global vision of agricultural and food risk management through the Agricultural and Food Risk Management Project (PRAA) created in 2019. 

The vision of the PRAA is to secure agro-sylvo-pastoral production capital and strengthen the resilience of stakeholders for sustainable food security. Furthermore, in the implementation of the project, a pilot phase of the “agricultural insurance” component on maize production is planned. This pilot phase concerns three regions: the Boucle du Mouhoun, the Center-West and the East.

In view of the specific nature of the “agricultural insurance” mechanism, it was important for the Ministry of Agriculture, in partnership with the National Insurance and Reinsurance Company (Sonar-IARD), to provide information to producers and raise their awareness of how the mechanism works.

At the opening of the meeting, the Secretary General of the Center-West region, Daouda Traoré, invited participants to follow the communications and to subscribe massively to agricultural insurance for the achievement of food security in Burkina Faso.

The producers in Burkina Faso welcomed the initiative of the Ministry of Agriculture

With this training, the actors of the agricultural world will become familiar with the “agricultural insurance” system. It will involve presenting the agricultural insurance mechanism to producers, explaining the content of the agricultural insurance product for maize, explaining the process for taking out agricultural insurance and informing producers of the compensation process in the event of a claim.

After a few explanations with examples to support the merits of the initiative, some heads of farmers’ organizations appreciated the approach taken by the Burkinabe government through the Ministry of Agriculture. For the Secretary General of the Peasants Confederation of Faso (CPF), Marc Gansonré, “the producers welcome this initiative with joy”.

For the participants, the implementation of agricultural insurance responds to a plea made on several occasions by farmers’ organizations to support producers in coping with the effects of climate change. This could galvanize production and strengthen the productive capacities of farms. “Agricultural insurance gives a guarantee to producers to go to financial institutions in order to have credits for production,” added CPF Secretary General Marc Gansonré.

For this pilot phase, subscriptions are open in the Center-West region until August 14th, for the sum of $11.15 (6,193 FCFA) per hectare.

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(Featured image by stanvpetersen via Pixabay)

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First published in lefaso.net, a third-party contributor translated and adapted the article from the original. In case of discrepancy, the original will prevail.

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