By Yusupha Jobe
Farmers in the North Bank Region of the Gambia are unwavering in their refusal to sell their groundnuts to the government allocated Secco’s, due to what they held as “unfavourable” pegged price” of D18,000.00 per ton, announced by the Barrow Government.
It could be recalled that in December, 2019, the Central Government under the leadership of President Adama Barrow had announced that it would buy groundnuts from farms at a price of D18,000.00 per ton.
However, most of the farmers in the NBR, as Mansa Banko gathered, are not amenable to that news, as they strongly urged the current dispensation to increase the price from D18,000.00 to either D25,000.00 or D30,000.00 per ton, without which, they would continue to sell their farm products to the traders from neighbouring Senegal or within the Gambia, to middlemen.
This reporter spoke with some farmers in the NBR, and one Kebba Secka said that the price for groundnut this year “is unfavourable” to farmers compared to other prices in the market.
Lamenting farmers are among the poorest people in the country, he underlined that all their livelihood, family, and expenses highly depend on their groundnuts and other field crops.
He maintained that they, therefore, deserve better price for their farm produce but, according to him, in the Gambia, this is not the case. The dissatisfied farmer told this medium that the government fixed price for groundnut “is very small compared to what the middlemen are buying from us”.
Secka also delved into the plight of farmers in the Gambia with regards to fertilizer, seeds and capital availability to farmers on time, opining that many a time, farmers don’t get them on time.
Urging the Barrow government to revisit the price for groundnut, Secka believed when the price is increased, it would to a great extent help the farmers, thereby improving their daily expenses.
Alluding to what most of the farmers generally termed “poor price”, Mr. Foday Ndure also stressed the need for significant increment in groundnut price, because he said this year’s season was not a success as they had wished, and therefore, the government should be of great help to the farmers. He appealed to the government to revisit the price for groundnut.
Mr. Gibril Dumbuya, a groundnut trader in NBR, shed light on his desire to assist Gambian farmers by raising the price of groundnut to twenty-three thousand dalasis (D23,000) per ton–which is five thousand more than government’s.
Dumbuya did not hide his unflinching determination to help the Gambian farmers by purchasing their produce at “favourable prices”.
Also adding his voice was Mr. Chebo Njie, who did not mince his words, revealing that if the government is not ready to assist farmers in The Gambia, they (the traders) will devise measures in helping them to get ends meet. This, he reasoned, “is because farming is the strongest backbone in the Gambia, so if farmers are being neglected, the entire nation will face the consequences”.
