RICE GAP NARROWS AS FEED SALONE ENTERS YEAR FOUR

Sierra Leone now grows nearly three-quarters of the rice it eats, according to the Feed Salone Year Three Report Card. The report says the Government’s flagship agriculture programme is bringing in less imported food, creating jobs and putting more food on household tables. Local production met 73 per cent of national rice consumption in 2025, up from 62 per cent in 2022. Farmers brought about 50,000 more hectares under rice and raised average yields. Over the same period, the rice import bill fell from USD 177 million to about USD 154 million, a saving of roughly USD 23 million.
Poultry grew even faster. Egg imports fell from about 56 million in 2024 to 31 million in 2025, a drop of almost 45 per cent. Farms surveyed by the Poultry Farmers Association of Sierra Leone now produce an estimated 173 million eggs a year. Onions are now grown commercially, and onion imports fell by more than three-quarters in 2025. Exports are also up. Cocoa exports grew by more than half between 2019 and 2024, and cashew exports hit a record in 2025. Much of the palm oil the country exports is now processed before it leaves.
The report says the share of severely food-insecure households has more than halved since 2023, and more families now eat an adequate diet. Nearly one million pupils receive school meals, with more locally grown rice, vegetables and vitamin-rich crops on their plates. Feed Salone interventions supported more than 22,000 jobs in Year Three. Women held nearly half of them, and young people held most. The report credits private businesses with much of the progress. Local firms built modern layer farms, feed mills and hatcheries, planted onions on a scale never seen before in the country, and expanded palm oil refining. Working with the Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces and local farmers, they brought more than 5,500 hectares under rice at Tormabum.
The report calls agricultural finance the defining reform of the year. A NLe 230 million Agricultural Credit Facility, run with the Bank of Sierra Leone, is lending to agribusinesses at 10 per cent interest. Matching grants worth USD 5.8 million went to 62 enterprises, and more than four in ten of them are owned by women. The Government also completed the Agricultural Finance Policy, validated the National Agricultural Insurance Policy and began designing an agricultural development bank. The report says these steps move farm finance “from separate schemes towards a national system that farmers and investors can plan around.” Agriculture’s share of the national budget has grown from 2 per cent to more than 8 per cent. More than USD 1 billion has been pledged to Feed Salone. Forty-three per cent of it is now committed to specific projects, up from 27 per cent a year ago. New projects include the USD 105 million Livestock and Livelihoods Development Project and a USD 75 million rice agro-processing zone in Kambia and Port Loko. The report says Year Four will focus on “finishing, scaling and institutionalising what works.” Rice is the top priority as the irrigation works and industrial mills are due to be finished by early 2027 in Tomaborm
The Government plans to put the finance and insurance policies into force and move ahead with the development bank, so more farmers get credit and protection against losses. In November, Sierra Leone will host the West Africa Integration and Investment Summit. There, the country’s Feed Salone Champions will meet regional buyers and investors, and Sierra Leone will help shape a regional fund for rice and agribusiness.