Farmers changing national policy: the bottom-up approach

Farming has never been easy in West Africa. The soil is poor, there is hardly any water available to irrigate the fields, and the sub-Saharan climate makes temperatures soar to 40 degrees Celsius. Yet despite these adverse conditions, most people in this part of Africa make their living from farming.

Getting through to the government

In Mali, one of the countries in this area, agriculture is strongly supported by the current administration. The development of a robust and vibrant agricultural sector is top priority. Consequently, a number of national plans and policies are currently being developed specifically to strengthen the sector. However, in the South of Sikasso where most of the farmers who grow crops reside, the general consensus among farmers is that the government’s current plans fall short of the mark. In their opinion, a lot more could be achieved if only the government would involve the farmers in their discussions about where to go with the national plan and how to get there. Unfortunately, it is hard for the farmers to get through to government: mainly because Mali’s administration is decentralised with authorities on a national, regional and local level. Although in theory decentralisation should guarantee the involvement of people at the local level, in reality communication between the different levels is weak. All major decisions and discussions about strategies and policies to strengthen the agricultural sector take place at the national level without proper consultation with the lower levels - due to poor information and communication between the different levels of government, as well as among the farmer cooperatives. 

Farmer cooperatives join forces

In 1996, some farmer cooperatives in Sikasso decided to take their future into their own hands. They founded a committee called the Regional Committee of Rural Consultation (Comité Régional de Concertation des Ruraux, CRCR), to represent and defend the interests of Sikasso’s farmers on a national and even international level, within the network of rural organisations and agricultural producers of West Africa; ROPPA. Aside from advocacy and lobbying, CRCR also planned to strengthen its members by offering them training on marketing and production techniques and by encouraging them to share practical information and their experiences with farming.  

Improving information flow

The Regional Community of Rural Consultation (CRCR) started off well, but soon discovered that its efforts to form a power block and gain more influence at both the national and international level were being hampered by a general lack of information and poor communication between the committee’s members as well as with external parties. For example, individual members found it hard to contact each other and exchange experiences, while the committee as a whole found it hard to articulate farmers’ needs and difficulties at both the national and international level. Basically, what they needed was a communication system that would help them improve the flow of information from the 215 farmers’ organisations and between their own local board (seven in the whole region of Sikasso), the so-called Local Committee for Coordination of Farmers’ Organisations (CLCOP) and the CLCOPs with the CRCR. In total, we are talking about 1 million farmers’ families that needed to be connected.

ICT advantages over the radio

In 2006, with the support of IICD, CRCR developed a project called Jèkafo Gèlèkan which, roughly translated, means ‘‘speaking together under the palaver tree”. The aim of the project is to facilitate access to information on all issues that are relevant to their members - about new laws and market opportunities, for example; to improve communication and knowledge sharing between members; to increase CRCR’s visibility; and to support their participation in decision-making at the level of the higher authorities. To accomplish this, internet and computers are being used to improve the information flows to and from the Local Committees for the Coordination of Farmers’ Organisations (CLCOPs) and local radio to disseminate specific information on a larger scale. Using modern information and communication technology was quite new to CRCR, but they quickly picked it up and have made good use of it so far.

Bakary Diarra, President of CRCR, observed:

“We did not know what a website was at first, but at the Round Table workshop organised by IICD in 2004, we discovered that ICT has some advantages over the radio, which was until then quite common to use. Nowadays – due to the increasing number of local radios [editor] - it is harder to reach people by radio or telephone than it is through internet and email. It is very easy to inform our members about what is going on much more quickly than before. Also, it is much quicker for me now to find out what our members’ needs are. I can ask for and disseminate information whenever I wish about upcoming activities, meetings or about my travels. For example, in May I had to go to Senegal to attend a regional (West African) meeting on agricultural politics. I let them know in advance that I would travel to this meeting and what we would talk about and then I asked them to respond. Based on their comments, I wrote a memorandum which I took along to this conference to represent the vision of Sikasso’s farmers.’’

 ‘‘I can give you another example: the government wanted our opinion about a law they wished to amend. At ten in the morning they sent me the document with the suggested amendments, which a consultant had prepared. By 3 pm that same day I had already finished my work and could send the government an email containing our recommendations.’’

Now that the members of CRCR know how to use it, they are also discovering other possibilities for ICT use too. For example, contacting customers in France when they hear that there are strikes going on and figuring out how they can best proceed with the export of their produce.

Facing challenges

Although the project has turned out to be quite successful so far, there is still room for improvement. An initial survey among the participants and beneficiaries of the project showed that more people still need extensive training in the use of computers to really make use of all the benefits that the internet and a computer can offer. Maintenance costs and the cost of connectivity are also a challenge as, at some point, funding from IICD will stop. But Bakary Diarra is determined to make it all work:

“In five years time I hope that the improved communication between our members and the higher authorities will make a real difference to the farmers and that their living conditions will have improved considerably. I also hope that many more people will become computer-literate and that the local branches of CRCR at the community level will know how to best make use of the new communication tools and take responsibility for informing their farmer cooperatives and other local branches (CLCOPs) of the CRCR. The farmers here in the South of Mali are having a hard time due to the cotton crisis. It is important for them to know what alternatives there are to growing cotton. Educated farmers know their way around - they will find a solution quickly - but the small-scale farmers have more difficulties in mastering this situation. They are not familiar with the various economic partnerships, such as EMUEOA (Union Monétaire et Economique de l’Ouest-Afrique) and PCDA (programme de Compétivité et Diversification Agricole) for example, and the risks and opportunities they can bring. In five years time I hope we will have  influenced governments in such a way that they are able to make sound and well-informed decisions that continuously help farmers improve their livelihoods.“