The Japanese Government is on Monday expected to turn over to the Liberian Government a food assistance and agricultural development program it has been running in Liberia since 2013, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) office said in Monrovia over the weekend.
Under the program, Japan made donations to support stallholder farmers and enhance smallholder agriculture development in Liberia.
A WFP statement says those donations are “aimed to support resilient agriculture practices that focused on community asset development on unproductive swamplands for staple food production.”
“The overarching objective of the effort is to specifically link smallholder rice producers and their surplus produce to profitable markets through the World Food Program’s market development initiatives,” the WFP statement further says.
Japanese Ambassador to Liberia Tsutomi Himeno, who is based at the Embassy of Japan in Ghana, will represent the Government and people of Japan, while Liberian Agriculture Minister Dr. Morgana Flomo will host and lead a representation of key line ministries on behalf of the Government of Liberia.
The WFP will be represented at the signing ceremony by its Country Director Bienvenu Djossa.
The statement also says, “this handover occasion symbolizes the tremendous gains Japan, Liberia, and the World Food Programme have made on improving the lives of smallholder producing farmers”.
According to the WFP, since its founding, the program has significantly boosted and ensured links between increased rice production and commercialization under the Japanese bilateral project.
It is said to have also made headways both in training beneficiaries and local agriculture technicians and reinforcing their skills, as well as, placing emphasis on women farmers’ participation, with the current project supporting 65% of households headed by women in beneficiary communities.