The Officer-in-Charge (OIC) of the Rice Value Chain Transformation Project (RVCTP) in the Gambia, Mr. Sang Mendy has, at the handing over of his project’s latest support to beneficiaries, made it clear that the ‘Agreement’ to be signed between the RVCTP/Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) and the concerned beneficiaries, generally requires that ‘the implements shall remain the property of the beneficiary as long as the beneficiary continues to demonstrate capacity to manage it’.
The senior project official was speaking on Saturday, 29th January, 2022 in Sapu, Central River Region South (CRR/S), where the beneficiary farmers received 11 Mini-combine harvesters; 44 Power tillers; 11 land levelers; 11 Reapers as well as 360 Scare Guns to deter hippos and birds from destroying rice fields from the project. Additionally, 455 MT of Certified Seeds, an office building and staff quarters were handed over to their respective recipients, geared towards enhancing the country’s drive towards being a rice self-sufficient state.
Mendy seized the opportunity to congratulate Madam Amie Fabureh who’s recently sworn-in as the country’s Minister of Agriculture (for the second time) under President Adama Barrow’s administration. Mendy further wished Fabureh–the country’s first female Agriculture Minister– healthy life as well as a very successful tenue in office (for the second time).
He has also told the handing over ceremony that the implements were given free of charge to the selected beneficiaries based on the project appraisal document.
However, in order to create safeguard mechanism for proper management and sustainability, Mendy said the project team found it necessary that the selected beneficiaries are required to sign an agreement with the project. He explained that this was conceived basically, in a bid to deviate from the past when equipment worth millions of dalasis were given to beneficiaries only to be mismanaged just few months after receiving them.
The RVCTP OIC pointed out that the agreement to be signed between the project, MoA and beneficiaries, generally requires that no part or whole of these implements shall be sold by any person or group.
“The equipment should be used to extend services to rice farmers across the rice value chain at reasonable cost, and that proceeds of these implements are being fairly distributed among owners,” he underlined.
The project, Mendy echoed, shall institute monitoring mechanism with the relevant implementing partners and report regularly on the operation and maintenance of the implements.
On that note, he said, “I call on everybody to put all hands on deck to ensure that we all achieve what we want to achieve in the Rice Sub-sector.”
The Sapu event was witnessed by Minister Fabureh, the Coordinator of the Central Projects Coordination Unit (CPCU), Mr. Abdou Touray, Regional Directors for Agriculture, CRR South and North, Director General of Agriculture, Dr. Saikou E. Sanyang, other Project Directors, Youth Organizations, Private Sector Partners, and Representatives of Farmer Organizations were in attendance.
