Guinea-Bissau | Gov’t delivers China-donated seeds and fertilizer

The government of Guinea-Bissau has begun distributing to farmers the agricultural production resources, namely seeds and fertilizer, donated by China at a ceremony last weekend in Bafatá.
Official information indicates that the donation involves 500 tons of rice seed, 617 tons of fertilizer and 20 tons of peanuts, along with bean varieties, and also six new tractors and several power tillers. They will be placed at the disposal of farmers in the country’s 39 sectors and eight regions, including the Autonomous Sector of Bissau.
Agriculture Minister Rui Nené Djata said that these production means should enable more than 400 hectares to be planted with peanuts and a similar area with beans. The rice seed should lead to a harvest of 30,000 tons.
Prime Minister Baciro Djá presided at the ceremony. He said the time had come to transform the family-based farming currently practiced in Guinea-Bissau into mechanised agriculture, to increase agricultural production and productivity.
Djá stated that one of his government’s goals is to create conditions to enable farmers to harvest up to 80,000 tons of rice, with a view to reducing imports of that cereal.
Beijing’s ambassador to the West African country notified the media last week that Chinese technical personnel would soon be arriving in Bissau to begin a project to manufacture tractors and other agricultural machinery.
Wang Hua made his statement at a ceremony on Friday, during which he said that the delivered goods are meant to help Guinea-Bissau produce rice “so that the country can become self-sufficient in this cereal.”
The ambassador stressed that Guinea-Bissau has natural resources such as plentiful water, arable land, a good climate and above all farmers, whereby the country can produce enough for domestic consumption and also export surpluses.
Guinea-Bissauan President José Mário Vaz in turn thanked China for the donation, adding that the production goods would delivered directly to his country’s farmers.
Vaz said that agricultural transformation and diversification are currently a national priority, which will necessarily involve gradual mechanization of the production chain and eventual marketing of the products in Guinea-Bissau. MDT/Macauhub