Onion glut disastrous for farmers in Niger

Onion is an important crop and source of income for farmers in Niger, where the hot, dry conditions are favourable for its cultivation. But an onion glut in the 2011 harvest season caused prices to collapse, with wide-ranging social and economic effects in a region where there are few other viable economic activities.

The collapse of Niger's economically important onion market has worsened a food and economic crisis that was already bad before.

In the Azara area of northern Niger, one of the onion sector's market advantages have been a harvest in November, weeks earlier than other onion-growing regions. But a delayed and poor rain season in 2011 meant harvest was pushed back, to the first weeks of 2012, when onion when from other areas in West Africa was also coming onto the market.

"In November, at the start of the harvest last year, the cost of a bag of onions was 15,000 CFA (23 euros), and in January of this year it fell to 1000 CFA," said an official of a humanitarian NGO.

Better cultivation techniques and more onion farmers are said to have also contributed to the glut.

African Agriculture

Niger seeks South African investment in livestock sector

Niger is one of the Sahelian countries most affected by poor rains and chronic food insecurity. Many organizations warn of a worsening humanitarian crisis.

With much of the country unsuitable for cropping, a long tradition of keeping livestock is one avenue of agricultural development.

Niger’s Livestock Minister, Mahaman Ehadji Ousmane, is reported by Bloomberg to have sought the assistance of South Africa’s State-owned Industrial Development Corporation to develop his country’s livestock industry.

“We are here to encourage South African investors to help us establish livestock-processing businesses in our country,” Bloomberg reports Ousmane as saying. “We are providing a tax-free investment opportunity for a minimum of 2 billion CFA francs ($4 million) invested.”

Reports say the IDC will offer 4.5 billion rand ($580 million) over the next five years to South African agro- processing projects that seek to promote rural economic development. The IDC planned to increase the fund by a further 1 billion rand annually over the next five years, according to the October 2011 reports.

Minister Ousmane said Niger ‘doesn’t have commercial farming,’ even as 87 percent of the population owns livestock. The country’s subsistence farming community has more than 35 million animals, including cattle, sheep, goats and camels, he said.

Livestock contributes about 22 percent of the nation’s export revenue, Ousmane said. There has been no investment in the country’s livestock and agricultural industries for the last 35 years, he said.

African Agriculture

Niger launches irrigation programme

Niger has launched a 10 billion CFA francs ($21.9 million) irrigation programme to grow at least 1 million tonnes of food, including 400,00 tonnes of cereals, the government said on Thursday.

The poor west Africa nation perched on the edge of the Sahara suffers frequently from droughts and often relies on international donors for food aid.

"This pilot crop irrigation programme is aimed at proving that not every drought should inevitably lead to famine in Niger," the government said in a statement on national TV.

It said 86,879 hectares of land near marshes, water catchment areas and farmland around the river Niger would be used.

About 80 percent of uranium-rich Niger's 16 million people, depend on agro-pastoral farming for their livelihood.

After a record harvest last year, the government has said in the past weeks it was concerned another food shortage could hit the country following poor rainfall this season, and 3 million people are being assisted with food supplies this year.

The country experienced one of its worst food crisis last year with about half of its population affected.

Reuters

Nigerian farmers complain subsidized inputs don't reach them

by Toryila Kajo, Makurdi And Halima Musa

While government says it spent huge sum of money in the procurement of fertilizer with the intention of selling it to farmers at subsidized price, famers complain that the farm inputs hardly reach them. Farmers are grumbling that they cannot access support from government. Getting fertilizer which should be readily available for instance is a herculean task.

A cross section of farmers in Benue State have said that they are yet to access the N2 billion agricultural loan promised them by the federal government. They also said getting necessary inputs for this cropping season has been troubling.

The chairman of Potatoes Growers' Association in Vandeikya local government area, Mr Thaddeus Nyam said ..."our soil is over used and requires the application of fertilizer which is very scarce now."

Another farmer, Mr. Joseph Chior who is chairman of Cassava Growers' Association in the state said he decided to visit the state's office of All Farmers' Association of Nigeria (AFAN) to know why the government's loan is not forthcoming.

The Cassava Growers Association chairman lamented that the month of July (which is half way the farming season) is almost gone without Benue State farmers having money to purchase fertilizer which is sold at N7,000 per bag in the black market.

Collaborating their claims, the state secretary to AFAN, Chief Samuel Kwaghna said since October, 2010, he received a letter from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) saying that about N2 billion commercial agriculture loan facility would be disbursed to farmers in Benue State for which over 2,800 groups submitted their loan proposals but nothing has come out of this.

Farmers in Kano said they were able to get little subsidised fertilizer. Mallam Umar Ibrahim said he was given one bag to share with two others. According to him, the quantity was quite inadequate.

Ibrahim said many rural farmers are still ignorant on how to access agro-allied facilities, adding that there is need for more sensitization on the part of government. He advised government to be sincere in its efforts to support agriculture in the state.

A female farmer who owns a farm in Bunkure local government area said she was able to access some assistance for her farmers group. "We have been able to get fertilizer and insecticides from the commercial agriculture project. We normally give 50 percent of the amount and the project would give the other 50 percent," she disclosed

Speaking on the assistance given the farmers by the Kano State government, the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Alhaji Muhammad Badawi said...there was no government that can satisfy the fertilizer needs of all Kano farmers, stressing that now government needs to purchase N16billion worth of fertilizer to meet the needs of Kano farmers.

He maintained that what government does is to give subsidised inputs so that instead of buying them at exorbitant prices in the market, the farmers get them at cheaper rates. He maintained that farmers bought a bag of fertiliser this at N1,900 as against the market price of N5000.

The second phase he said is the procurement of tractors. Badawi said the state government in collaboration with the federal government will procure about 80 tractors which will be sold to farmers groups at a subsidized rates.

"Under this arrangement the state and with federal governments will pay 40 percent of the amount and farmers will pay the remaining 60 percent. So if the tractor is bought at N5million, farmers will get it at N3million. Government has set aside N63million for the procurement of the tractors," he announced.

The last phase as disclosed by the Perm Sec is training of farmers on how to go about farming activities in more profitable ways. He said government has set aside another N63million for the revival of the five agric schools located in Gwarzo, Rano, Dambatta and Kadawa. If revived, the schools will embark on training of farmers on how to use cattle to plough the land establish fisheries, poultry and livestock farming.

He explained that through the Fadama III and the commercial agric project, farmers have received assistance to the tune of N138m and N186million from the two projects. The process of accessing these assistances was through the formation of farmer's associations at the ward and state level.

Daily Trust

Africa’s flourishing Niger Delta threatened by Libya water plan

by Fred Pearce

Threatened by Libya Water Plan Daouda Sanankoua is an aquatic mayor, and proud of it. The elected boss of the district of Deboye arrived for our meeting in the West African state of Mali last month by overnight ferry. At this time of year, the majority of his district is flooded. Thank goodness. “More water is good,” he said, peering at his foreign inquisitor over his glasses. “Everything here depends on the water, but the government is taking our water.”

While we spoke, in the tiny schoolyard of Akka village, a few meters from the lapping waters of Lake Deboye, the headlines around the world brought news of flood disasters in Australia, Brazil, and Sri Lanka. But Daouda was grateful for the annual swelling of the River Niger, which left most of his 24 villages marooned. For without the water, they would be desert.

The floods in what geographers call the inner Niger delta nurture abundant fish for the Bozo people, who lay their nets in every waterway and across the lakes. As the waters recede, they leave wet soils in which the Bambara people plant millet and rice, and they expose vast aquatic pastures of bourgou (or hippo grass) that sustain cattle and goats brought by nomadic Fulani herders from as far away as Mauritania and Burkina Faso. This inland delta is Africa’s second-largest floodplain and one of its most unique wetlands. Seen from space, it is an immense smudge of green and blue on the edge of the Sahara.

But this rare and magnificently productive ecosystem is now facing an unprecedented threat, as a Libyan-backed enterprise has begun construction of a project inside Mali that will divert large amounts of Niger River water for extensive irrigation upstream.

This is all part of a grand plan by Gaddafi to make his desert nation self-sufficient in food.This is all part of a grand plan by Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi to make his desert nation self-sufficient in food through long-term deals with nearby countries to grow food for Libya. Mali’s president has agreed to the scheme, which numerous experts say will enhance Libyan food security at the expense of Malian food security by sucking dry the river that feeds the inland delta, diminishing the seasonal floods that support rich biodiversity — and thriving agriculture and fisheries vital to a million of Mali’s poorest citizens — on the edge of the Sahara desert.

“More people will lose than win from most irrigation projects in Mali,” says Jane Madgwick, CEO of Netherlands-based Wetlands International, with whom I traveled for three days in the inner Niger delta. “These projects will decrease food security by damaging the livelihoods of those most vulnerable. What they are trying to do at the moment makes no sense because there is simply not enough water.”

Larger than Belgium, the Niger’s inland delta, laced with rivers and marshes, runs for 250 miles from northeast to southwest in central Mali, one of Africa’s poorest countries. The rights to harvest the delta’s fish and graze pastures are based on long-standing custom neither known nor recognized beyond its borders. I had spent days exploring this world as the seasonal floodwaters began to recede. I watched the arrival of the Fulani and talked to fishing families as they packed up their homes and left their villages to set up temporary camps beside the pools where the fish would concentrate in the weeks ahead.

Out there in the waters somewhere were a few surviving hippos, African manatees, and the odd crocodile. Madgwick constantly grabbed her binoculars to spot kingfishers, marsh harriers, cormorants, and purple herons, many of them winter migrants from Europe. Her organization is working with locals to revive flooded forests destroyed in past droughts, to maintain fish ponds among the flooded grasses, to extend the new practice of cultivating bourgou, and to encourage kitchen gardens planted by women’s groups.

But all this is threatened by events upstream, said the mayor: Others want his water. Over a torch-lit evening meal of Nile perch, millet porridge, and bananas — all fruits of the wetland — he said that this year the rains were good and the waters high. But even so, some dams built prior to the Libyan project, which irrigate 235,000 acres, have already diverted water and changed the timing of when it reaches the wetland, damaging the wet pastures and upsetting fish breeding. Some species have disappeared as a result. And, say Madgwick and others, much worse is to come.

Daouda Sanankoua said dams have already diverted water and changed the timing of when it reaches his district. Libya’s wholesale move into Malian irrigation and agriculture is the result of a secret deal between Mali’s president, Amadou Toumani Toure, and Libya’s Colonel Gadaffi. Paid for by Gadaffi’s sovereign investment fund, theLibya Africa Portfolio Fund for Investment, the deal hands the land to a Libyan-controlled organization called Malibya for 50 years and gives the Libyans undisclosed rights to the region’s water. Why would the Mali president sign up to this?

Local campaigners say their government is in thrall — and hock — to Libya because it has become dependent on Libya for aid and investment. Many of its civil servants work in offices built by Libya, and international visitors stay at Libyan-built hotels. And, says Lamine Coulibaly, head of communications for the Mali small farmers’ union, CNOP, the government is so obsessed with getting investment for its agriculture that it cannot see when that investment will do more harm than good to its people.

Before going to the delta, I had visited a new canal stretching 25 miles north from the River Niger to 250,000 acres of proposed irrigated land at the edge of the marshes. The canal, part of the Libyan project, was dug last year by Chinese contractors, who are now preparing the first 15,000 acres of fields.

The project is one of many major investments by Libya all across Mali. Gadaffi is using his petrodollars to fund government buildings, hotels, and other high-profile infrastructure. Critics such as Coulibaly call the farm mega-project a land grab. But far more important, it is also a water grab on a huge scale. Coulibaly adds: “We have enough land; we don’t have enough water.”

The scale is breathtaking. The brand new intake works for the scheme can grab as much as 210 cubic meters a second, potentially more than doubling
The delta is a vital green resource for both humans and wildlife on the edge of the Sahara.the amount of water taken from the river for irrigation. The director general of Malibya, Abdalilah Youssef, boasted in 2008 that his new canal could supply up to 4 cubic kilometers of water a year to the enterprise’s fields of rice, tomatoes, and fodder crops for cattle. The current take for all other existing irrigation projects is 2.7 cubic kilometers a year.

Already, engineers at the Office du Niger — an agency created by presidential fiat to develop land upstream of the inner Niger delta — admit they are struggling to maintain the minimum flow of 40 cubic meters a second down the Niger to the delta during the dry season, when an estimated 70 percent of river flow goes to farms rather than the wetland. The effects of taking more could be catastrophic on the floating forests and bourgou pastures at the heart of the delta’s ecosystems and human livelihoods.

A vital green resource for both humans and wildlife on the edge of the Sahara, the delta is a wintering ground for millions of migrating European birds and is vital to the flow of the Niger River and its fisheries. All this is threatened by the Libyan project. For example, planned dams and diversions will reduce the growth of the important bourgou grasses by almost two-thirds, according to a study by Leo Zwarts, a water management expert for the Dutch government.

Now, however, Malian officials have no control over the project. Their president has signed that away. They say the Libyans have carried out a social and environmental impact assessment, although its contents have not been made public. The job of the Malian officials is simply to organize compensation for the thousands of people who are expected to lose their homes to the irrigation projects and to find new land for those farmers who refuse to be turned into Gadaffi’s laborers.

There is no official confirmation, but few doubt that the rice grown here will go to Libya. More than 1,200 miles away across the Sahara, Gaddafi has spent $30 billion over the past three decades building the Great Man-made River, which pumps ancient water from deep beneath the desert through 1,800 miles of huge pipes to irrigate farms on the Mediterranean coast. But even with that giant hydrological enterprise in operation, Libya still depends on foreign markets for three-quarters of its grain.

The giant farm being built on the edge of the inner Niger delta by Malibya is his next big gambit.

Mali of course needs development. It is changing and so are the wants and needs of its people. Schools and clinics are starting to appear; every fishing encampment, however temporary, has a TV antenna; the fishing nets are
Any disruption of the region’s traditional way of life could feed Al Qaeda’s violent agenda.made of nylon and come from China; the kids wear Obama T-shirts and support European soccer teams; motorbikes are starting to replace donkeys; there is sporadic cellphone coverage and young village men break the still wetland nights with their sound systems. These days, too, traditional lines of ethnicity and livelihood are blurred as cattle herders take up fishing, fishers harvest grain, and millet farmers go herding. But the fecundity of the delta remains the basis of their survival in one of the poorest countries on Earth.

Many government officials see saving the wetland as an environmental priority they cannot afford in the push for human development. But in fact, maintaining the wetland is essential to development.

This year, the Mali government is expected to publish a ten-year “sustainable development plan” for the delta. Early drafts are said to sanction a big expansion of irrigation. European aid agencies funding the process have reportedly demanded a rewrite. Whatever it finally contains, the plan faces a long consultation process before being enacted, by which time the game may be over, the water swallowed up by the Libyan project and others.




MORE FROM YALE e360

Does Egypt Own The Nile?
A Battle Over Precious Water
A dispute between Egypt and upstream African nations has brought to the fore a long-standing controversy over who has rights to the waters of the Nile. The outcome, Fred Pearce writes, could have profound consequences for the ecological health of the river and for one of the world’s largest tropical wetlands.
READ MOREThis may not just be a local matter either. With Al Qaeda busy recruiting disaffected people such as the Tuareg nomads around Mali’s borders, any disruption to the traditional way of life could feed its violent agenda.

So this is a key moment that will likely determine the fate of one of Africa’s great natural resources, a living embodiment of how humans and nature can live not just in harmony but in synergy. Get it wrong and they will be creating new desert while claiming all the while to be greening it. Get it wrong and the repercussions could spread far and wide.

As we left the heart of the wetland for the provincial town of Mopti, our boat kept grounding on the bottom of the narrower waterways. Macaques laughed as we scrambled to resume our journey. The low water was simply a sign of the changing season, but it felt like an omen for the wetland.

POSTED ON 03 FEB 2011 IN BUSINESS & INNOVATION POLICY & POLITICS POLICY & POLITICS SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY SUSTAINABILITY WATER AFRICA NORTH AMERICA

http://e360.yale.edu/feature/a_major_libyan_water_project_puts_africas_niger_delta_at_risk/2366/

Better soybean varieties offer African farmers more opportunities

Malawi and Nigeria have released new improved soybean varieties to increase the production of the legume.
The three varieties, one in Malawi and two in Nigeria, outperformed the popular varieties being grown in the two countries during on-station and on-farm trials.

Soybean  is an inexpensive source of protein and is being increasingly used for animal feed, food and as a raw material for producing high-quality protein products. The plant also improves soil fertility by fixing atmospheric nitrogen. smile.

 The varieties were developed by the International Institute of Tropical of Agriculture (IITA) in collaboration with the Malawian Department of Agricultural Research Services (DARS) and the Nigerian National Cereal Research Institute (NCRI).

The Malawi Agricultural Technology Clearing Committee (ATCC) officially approved the release of the variety TGx 1740-2F on 18 January 2011 while the Nigeria Varietal Release Committee released TGx 1987-10F and TGx 1987-62F on 2 December 2010.

According to Hailu Tefera, IITA Soybean Breeder based in Malawi, the varieties consistently did better than the standard and local checks, giving high grain yield in multiple locations under on-station and on-farm trials.

In Nigeria the two medium maturing varieties proved highly resistant to rust, bacterial blight and cercospora leaf diseases. The varieties are preferred by many farmers because they smoother weeds and reduce the cost of weeding. Farmers that participated in the on-farm trials of the varieties said they preferred them especially for their golden color at maturity.

In Malawi, TGx 1740-2F exceeded the grain variety Nasoko and the widely grown promiscuous variety Magoye which were used as checks by 10% and 32% respectively during the two-year multi-location on-station trials with a mean grain yield of 2464 kg/ha.

The variety performed equally well during on-farm participatory variety selection trials in four districts of central Malawi. In 2009/10 season, it out-yielded all the new types of soybean varieties under testing by giving 2248 kg/ha. It also surpassedNasoko and Magoye by 15% and 38%, respectively.

“Farmers had many reasons for falling in love with this variety: it matures early, has more pods per plant up to the top of the plant, performs well under poor and erratic rainfall, and has better lodging resistance. This means it remains standing upright for the better part of its growth and maturity.” says Tefera. “It is a big milestone for IITA as this is the first time that an IITA developed promiscuous soybean variety is released in Malawi,” he adds.

Promiscuous legume varieties work with the wide range of nitrogen-fixing bacteria - they capture the nitrogen in the air and make it available to the plants - in the soil while the non-promiscuous ones are selective and need specific strains which, if not present have to be introduced through inoculation. They are important for boosting productivity in Africa where poor soils are common and fertilizers are out of reach for many small-holder farmers.

The two countries are among the top five producers of the crop in Africa with Nigeria being the first and Malawi the fifth after South Africa, Uganda and Zimbabwe.

The development of these varieties serves as a boost to African nations as they strive to attain the Millennium Development Goal number one, which seeks to reduce hunger and poverty.

IITA

Effects of 2009 drought cause patoralists to migrate south from Niger to Nigeria

As the effect of drought and crop failure lingers in Niger, 250,000 Nigerien pastoralists and their 500,000 livestock have migrated to Nigeria's northern border states of Yobe, Borno, Sokoto and Katsina, the local press reported.

Last year's drought in Niger has caused crop failure which has in turn put over 7.5 million people at the risk of famine.

'More than 90 per cent of the pastoralists are Nigerien Tuaregs along with their wives and children, as well as a herd of cows, sheep and goats,' said the Programme Manager for Livestock Development Project in Yobe state, Dr. Mustapha Gaidam.

One of the migrating pastoralists, Buba Kari, was quoted as saying the migration was necessary because 'there is no food for us and our animals. We have to leave the Sahel region and move to places that we can get graze land and water for our people and animals before they die.'

Afriquejet

Critical food shortages plague Niger

by Boureima Hama

Only five years after a severe food shortage north-central Africa is again fearing the worst before the September harvest, with 10 million people threatened in this arid region known as the Sahel.

In Niger alone, the country hardest hit, more than seven million residents -- nearly half the population -- are in need of food, and both Niger and neighboring Chad have declared states of emergency.

Niger's south-central Maradi region is a testament to things again gone wrong: villages and schools lie deserted after hundreds of people fled drought and hunger, some moving to the cities while others headed south to Nigeria. Animals are dying from lack of fodder and water.

"This is the worst crisis in 30 years", worse than 1984 or 2005, said Alio Mahamane, a member of Niger's farmers organisation.

Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad and Mali are similarly affected, after last year's insufficient or irregular rains left poor crops and a desperate shortage of cattle feed in a region already suffering endemic malnutrition. The situation has triggered appeals for international aid for this belt spanning the southern flank of the Sahara Desert.

While the main planting season for regional staples -- millet, sorghum and notably maize -- starts in June, the coming months up to harvest time will be the most difficult, as people try to cope with already sparse food supplies for themselves and their animals.

In hard-hit Niger, the situation continues to worsen. EU Commissioner Kristalina Georgieva warned that more than three of the country's seven million hungry suffered from "severe" food insecurity, as the EU allocated an extra 24 million euros (29 million dollars) for the Sahel. Georgieva, who is in charge of the bloc's humanitarian aid, said Niger's hungry include 139,000 children with acute signs of malnutrition.

Overall, the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) estimates that 300,000 children under five die in the Sahel each year directly or indirectly from malnutrition.

The EU's extra 24 million will go towards diagnosing and treating malnutrition along with other food and health projects, including mobile health units for pastoral communities. It brings total EU aid to the Sahel to 44 million euros this year, up from 33 million in 2009.

Regional food prices meanwhile have soared amid speculation linked to the shortage of staple goods.

After accusations of not anticipating the food crisis five years ago, UN agencies and non-governmental organisations have reacted more quickly this time around. International aid for Niger started flowing in last month, with 21,000 tonnes of free cereals distributed to 1.5 million people with government assistance.

"Without this aid, I would no doubt already be buried," said a farmer in Tahoua in western Niger, as he loaded his cart with sacks of cereal distributed by aid workers.

But the World Food Programme's (WFP) deputy director for Niger, Gianluca Ferrera, warned of a shortfall of up to 40 million dollars (33 million euros) for Niger alone to make ends meet until September.

In Chad, where up to two million people need assistance, the United Nations is working to avert "disaster" and the WFP has launched an emergency operation for more than 700,000 people.

"We estimate our needs at 100,000 tonnes of cereals," said Chadian Agriculture Minister Albert Pahimi Padacke. "So far, we have received 55,000."

At Mao, capital of Chad's worst-hit western Kanem region, Mayor Mallah Adji said the situation was becoming "more and more critical" as no rain had been reported yet.

Sixty kilometres (40 miles) from Mao, at Nokou, people make do with whatever dates they can find near dry river beds to survive, said a member of the Action contre la faim (Action against Hunger) NGO.

Younger people also leave for oil-rich Libya hoping for a better life.

In Cameroon a health ministry official called the food situation extremely critical in the north, where some 339,000 people were being assisted by the United Nations.

And in northern Mali, more than 250,000 people are receiving emergency aid from the international community and the central government after scarce rainfall over the last two years.

The food situation has been aggravated by a pastoral crisis that has compelled increased nomads' migration southward and increased conflicts between them and farmers, a statement by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) said in May before a special meeting on the food crisis.

Local representatives meanwhile cite global warming as a cause for the encroaching desert.

But in neighbouring Burkina Faso where authorities have started selling cereals at lower prices the NGO Afrique Verte's (Green Africa) Philippe Ki said the crisis was "contained" even though "pockets of drought" still existed.

AFP

Niger is on the brink of food shortages

by Tom Burgis

Millions of people in Niger are at risk of running short of food, relief agencies have warned, as high prices and a lack of rain take their toll on one of the world's poorest countries.

The landlocked west African nation lies at the centre of a food crisis spanning the Sahel, the arid region on the southern fringe of the Sahara.

The United Nations estimates that 7.8m people in Niger could be affected unless donors deploy some $130m (€102m, £88m) of emergency aid immediately. Parts of Mali, Burkina Faso, northern Nigeria and central Chad are also at risk.

"All the signs show that we are at a critical moment," said Touré Kalil Hamadoun, who leads the operations of the charity Médecins Sans Frontières in Zinder, a town in southern Niger.

Weekly admissions of malnourished children to MSF's main feeding station in Zinder doubled in the second half of April.

Many emaciated infants have complications including respiratory diseases and diarrhoea. Health centres have seen 56,000 malnourished children this year.

Despite Niger's uranium reserves, most of its 15m people live in poverty. After poor rains last year, the cereal harvest was 31 per cent lower than in 2008, says the World Bank.

Surpluses in the region - much of which forms part of a common market - could make up the shortfall. But some relief officials fear that higher prices are fostering speculation as traders hoard food in the hope of boosting profits.

A government bulletin from mid-April found that prices for staples including millet, sorghum, maize and rice were "at an exceptionally high level", standing between 6 per cent and 17 per cent above the average of the past five years.

Compared with the same month in 2005 - when a plague of locusts contributed to food shortages - prices for millet, sorghum and maize were all higher this April, while the price of imported rice had increased by more than a third.

Food prices in many poor countries have not followed those on international commodity markets and fallen from their peaks in 2008, according to the Food and Agriculture Organisation .

The UN body estimated that high prices, falling incomes and increased unemployment had left more than 1bn people undernourished last year - the highest level since 1970.

"Any benefits from falling world cereal prices have been more than offset by the global economic downturn," the FAO found.

Aid workers stress that starvation in Niger will be averted if donors back government efforts with more food and cash.

"There is enough food in the area but the prices are too high," says Johannes Schoors, Niger country director for Care, an aid agency.

During a visit to the region that included Zinder in late April, Sir John Holmes, the UN's senior emergency relief official, said that without structural changes, "it will become increasingly difficult to contain these recurrent crises, which do so much to undermine economic and social progress in the Sahel".

Sir John urged investment in irrigation and measures to prevent the encroachment of the Sahara. These steps would be more effective than periodic emergency appeals.

However, they would also require aid agencies and the UN to work closely with national governments. Niger has been ruled by a military regime since February, when junior officers toppled President Mamadou Tandja.

The junta has promised to return the country to democracy and the regime has acted speedily to respond to the crisis. But much direct budgetary aid remains suspended. Western diplomats said any resumption was highly unlikely until elections were held.

Financial Times

Can drip irrigation break Africa's hunger cycles?

by David Lewis

As the world's aid agencies scramble, yet again, to feed millions of hungry in Africa's Sahel, some smallholders in the semi-arid region are reporting bumper harvests of onions, potatoes and tomatoes.

The reason? Drip irrigation systems made up of water tanks and rows of black pipes, an Israeli innovation that some predict could end the area's aid dependency. Others however, including supporters of the system, warn of caveats.

"With the watering cans, we couldn't do more than one harvest per year. With this innovation, we can do as many as three, so our earnings are multiplied by three," said Yamar Diop, a 73-year-old father of ten.

During a recent visit to the region U.N. aid chief John Holmes appealed not just for the tens of millions of dollars needed to keep people alive, but for more action to address the root causes of the recurrent food crises.

Farmers like Diop say they are doing just that. He is one of about 2,500 farmers across the Sahel who, over the last few years, have taken part in the African Market Garden, an Israeli initiative to use low pressure drip irrigation to break dependence on rain and boost crops, nutrition and incomes.

Diop's harvests will earn him 800,000 CFA francs ($1,624) over the year, while the U.N. will spend $190 million over the same period to get through the food crisis, prompting calls for the donors to invest more on long term projects.

"Niger is going to have a big problem this year," said Dov Pasternak, the head of the Sahel programme at the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), referring to the rush to bring aid into the land-locked nation.

"This will cost millions but how much is being spent on agriculture? I have a gut feeling the ratio is huge in favour of food relief," he said. "It is the poverty that we have to deal with, rather than providing food security."

ICRISAT says the African Market Garden irrigation system means returns on land, water and labour are multiplied by two, four and six, respectively, when compared with traditional vegetable production systems on the continent.

That could allow places like Niger to shift from perennial sites of hunger into producers of food for the regional market of around 250 million people, Pasternak said.

Contrary to the area's drought-ridden image, Pasternak says water is available. Most obvious are the billions of litres that flow down Niger's eponymous river. But, with technology and investment, shallow underground bodies called dallos, or deeper regional aquifers, offer trillions of litres of potential water.

Consequently, Pasternak argues that farmers should be helped to invest in irrigation and focus on producing high yield crops that they can sell, and use the money to buy food that is more reliable and cheaper to grow elsewhere.

"You cannot rely on rain for sustainable agriculture as two out of five are drought years," he said.

Citing successes turning deserts back home into bread baskets, Israel says it can help revamp agriculture in Africa's Sahel and is funding a string of similar projects in the region.

At the Keur Yaba Diop site, near Thies, farmers paid an initial 15,000 CFA to join the project, around 10 percent of the full cost of the equipment. They also pay a bill of around 60,000 CFA for water and fertilisers during each harvest.

Some fell behind on payments and were kicked off the project. Others struggled with the routine maintenance needed to keep water flowing through the irrigation pipes. In one project, insistence that farmers grew organic crops has trimmed volumes.

But the project managers are bullish and Diop, dubbed a "model student," has taken up spare land and reinvested money he earned to buy more irrigation kits and farm more land.

"Donors say it is too expensive. But I tell them that you have to invest but the payback is quick. In Africa there is a negative attitude towards investment," Pasternak said.

The cost of scaling up the project is a major concern, but not the only one, says Bruce Langford, an irrigation expert and senior lecturer at the University of East Anglia in the UK.

"Is it likely that farmers will copy-cat this technology without external incentives? My gut feeling is they won't because it is very expensive," he said, warning that the systems risked costing far more than the $500-$3,000 per hectare threshold of affordability for irrigation schemes.

Langford also flagged issues such the impact on water sources if projects are replicated on a large scale, access to markets and the need to renew equipment due to damage in the harsh conditions. ICRISAT says current models last three years.

"The research needs doing, the pilot testing needs doing. (But) the farmers need to be seriously engaged as to whether they think the technology is going to work," he said.

Alioune Diouf, a technical advisor for the Israeli embassy in Senegal, said the simplification of technology would help change the mentality of farmers, to make them think more like entrepreneurs, but more needs to be done to support them.

"Drip irrigation can and must be a solution for agriculture in Africa but it must be accompanied by other parameters like organisation and education," he said.
"If there isn't this, you can forget agriculture."

Reuters

UN warns of possible 'total crop failure' in Niger

Niger is threatened with total crop failure in some areas and the situation is worse than the 2005 crisis, the UN humanitarian chiefJohn Holmes John Holmeshas said.

Ex-President Mamadou Tandja, toppled in a coup in February, was criticised for doing too little then and saying the crisis had been exaggerated.

Nearly 8m people are affected by the drought this year and the UN says up to $130m (£85.5m) is needed to help them.


On a visit to the West African country, Mr Holmes said aid agencies had identified - and were dealing with - the problem early enough to make a difference.

"We have sounded the alarm much earlier," he said, "and we are tackling it much earlier so I hope that we can avoid the worst, and avoid the kind of scenes we've seen before in Niger or in Ethiopia in the 1980s."

The UN emergency relief co-ordinator was visiting the Zinder area of southern Niger, where he said rates of malnutrition in children had increased because of the lack of food.

A man said he had lost more than 80 cattle. "The remaining donkeys are so weak that we have to help. We have to lift them up every time, because there is no food. No pasture."


BBC

Niger receives fertilizer aid from Morocco

The Kingdom of Morocco has granted 5 million dirhams, or 289 million FCFA,  to Niger for the purchase of fertilizers ahead of the next agricultural season.

According to the Minister of Agricultural Development, Mr. Mahaman Moussa, the assistance represents the second installment of the biannual financial aid from Morocco.

"This gesture bears testimony to the interest that the Kingdom of Morocco bestows on development and to the intensification of the Nigerien agriculture. It will enable (us) to improve the productivity and competitiveness of agricultural production, an indispensable condition to achieve food self-sufficiency and the improvement of the revenues of rural producers," Moussa said.

Morocco has already financed several projects in the area of agricultural development in Niger, particularly the provision of emergency seeds during the 2001, 2002, 2003 seasons and during 2005 a donation of one tho usand tons of fertilizers.

The countries enjoy excellent relations and have a mixed cooperation commission that meets every two years.


Afriquejet

Late rains have delayed the growing season in most of Niger

Low rainfall has disrupted the planting season throughout Niger as farmers who sowed seeds in May are forced to replant when their first crops died, according to the national association of farmers.

"There are real concerns with the planting season this year," said the association's coordinator, Djibo Bagna.

Idrissa Halidou in the semi-arid village of Torodi near the border with Burkina Faso said he lost his first planting. "We had planted in May, but lack of rains forced us to plant again." He said he was tapping into his cereal stock to face the lean season.

The period between plantings and harvests typically lasts from June to September. Nationwide, almost 8,000 out of 11,000 villages had reported to the government first plantings by 30 June.

In 2009 late rains have resulted in plants withering in dry pocketsin certain localities, especially during the first 20 days in May, according to the government's 30 June inter-ministerial report on rain and agriculture, which characterized rainfall in most parts of Niger as 'weak to moderate.'

The national farmer association's Bagna said in some regions at this time last year, crops had already begun to grow.

Farmers in Diffa, a commune in the southeast, said the first rain of the season arrived on 14 July, a month later than in 2008.

Delayed rains have resulted in pastures that are progressively degrading in quality, causing pastoralists to seek rain-fed pastures elsewherefor their animals. The most affected areas are Diffa and Maradi in the south, according to the government’s 10 July rain report.

Late rains coincide with rising food prices, according to the government's weekly system of information on agricultural markets (SIMA), which reported that as of the first week of July, the prices of millet and maize were three percent higher than the previous week, while sorghum was five percent more expensive, costing up to US$42 for 100kg.

Prices for millet, sorghum, rice and maize are up to six percent higher than this time last year, according to the government's price index.

IRIN

ICRISAT develops techniques for soil reclamation in West Africa

The International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) has developed an innovative technique of reclaiming severely degraded, abandoned farmlands in Western Africa successfully bring them back into profitable agricultural production.

This accomplishment is significant for the semi-arid Sudano-Sahelian region, whose few arable lands are under extreme pressure to produce more food for a growing population in the backdrop of climatic variations that threaten the region’s fragile agricultural production, and food security.

Additionally, the recovered degraded lands, which had been allocated to women in a moribund state, are giving back Niger’s largely marginalised women their socio-economic rights to making a livelihood through agriculture.

“In dry West Africa, studies have shown that between 13 and 15 percent of children are suffering from acute nutritional deficiency”, says Prof Dov Pasternak, a scientist at ICRISAT. “By working with women to grow indigenous vegetable and fruit trees, we have not only restored the self-worth of women but also enabled them to better care for their children and families as well as make some money on top of it all.”

According to Prof Pasternak, more than half of the Sahelian soils are severely degraded, continuously losing nutrients and organic matter through wind and water erosion resulting in hard-to-plough encrusted lateritic soils that characterise many abandoned farms across Niger. Droughts account for crop failure in two out of every five years.

Extremely adverse weather conditions in the Sahel and growing population pressure are adversely affecting agricultural production in the Sahel. In Niger, population pressure has progressively led to highly fragmented farm holdings whose ownership and farming rights are generally vested in men. This has in turn systematically edged women out of farming leaving them without means of adequately caring for their families, or making an income.

“(Some areas of Niger) are witnessing emergence of a first generation of women who do not work the land. This process begins when a woman’s gamana is cultivated by her husband because it is so small that her labour is only required for certain types of harvest. In Jiratawa, we found a second generation of landless women who have never farmed because they never had the opportunity to help their mother in her gamana as she was landless too. They don’t even know how to sow seeds!” a study undertaken by the International Institute for Environment and Development says.

In an effort to keep women farming and to avert their impoverishment, the Government of Niger, in 2004, enacted a Rural Code to govern access to and use of land and other natural resources. Land tenure is governed by a variety of unsynchronised laws ranging from customary, Islamic and civil laws. The Rural Code is envisioned to enable women to directly own and use land as they wish. But initial trends show that more often than not women are being allocated the least productive, often abandoned, lands that men cannot put to any use.

ICRISAT is developing a range of techniques to help Niger’s women transform their erstwhile unproductive, impenetrable crust-lands into productive farmland. The techniques present an integrated system to food production and include rebuilding the fertility of the degraded soils, water management for this semi-arid zone and general land reclamation using drought-tolerant tree species.

ICRISAT scientists have taught women how to create a favourable medium for planting crops that will enable effective rooting, as well as how to manage the soils to prevent water-logging. Farmers have learnt how to harvest rain-water on-farm using micro-catchments or planting pits known as zai holes, which are able to hold water for prolonged periods after the rains. The zai holes also hold soil and compost to support the growth of locally adapted, deep-rooting and highly nutritious fruit and vegetable trees such as the Pomme du Sahel, Ziziphus Mauritania, and the Moringa, Moringa stenopetala.

The Pomme du Sahel fruit is rich in iron, calcium, phosphorus and has ten times as much Vitamin C as the regular apple, while the Moringa leaves, Niger’s most popular vegetable, has seven times as much Vitamin C as oranges, four times as much Vitamin A as carrots, four times as much calcium as milk, thrice as much potassium as is found in bananas and twice as much protein as is found in milk.

These and other crop trees under test for reclamation of Western Africa’s degraded farmlands are typically tolerant to drought, high soil salinity and water-logging. They hold the promise of transforming vast swathes of degraded land in West Africa into Africa’s new horticultural front. ICRISAT estimates the value of fruit and vegetable produced from these indigenous tree crops at about USD1, 200 per hectare.

About ICRISAT: The International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) is a nonprofit, non-political organization that does innovative agricultural research and capacity building for sustainable development with a wide array of partners across the globe. Its mission is to help empower 600 million poor people to overcome hunger, poverty and a degraded environment in the dry tropics through better agriculture. ICRISAT, is one of 15 centers supported by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR).

ICRISAT

Nigeria establishes agricultural credit scheme

by Oluwaseyi Bangudu

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in collaboration with the federal government of Nigeria, represented by the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Water Resources, has established a Commercial Agriculture Credit Scheme, otherwise referred to as CACS, for promoting commercial agricultural enterprises in Nigeria, as part of its developmental role.

According to a communiqué released by the Central Bank of Nigeria on April 21, this fund will complement other special initiatives of the Central Bank of Nigeria in providing concessionary funding for agriculture such as the Agricultural Credit Guarantee Scheme (ACGS), which is mostly for small-scale farmers, Interest Draw-back scheme, Agricultural Credit Support Scheme, etc.

The scheme shall be financed from the proceeds of the N200 billion bond to be raised by the Debt Management Office (DMO). The fund shall be made available to the participating bank(s) to finance commercial agricultural enterprises.

In addition, state governments and the FCTA could also borrow up to 20 per cent of the bond proceeds for on-lending to farmers. The ceiling to the states may be reviewed as the need arises, by the Project Management Committee (PMC).

According to the Central Bank, the objectives of the scheme are:

- To fast track development of the agricultural sector of the Nigerian economy by providing credit facilities to commercial agricultural enterprises at a single digit interest rate

- To enhance national food security by increasing food supply and effecting lower agricultural produce and product prices, thereby promoting low food inflation

- To reduce the cost of credit in agricultural production to enable farmers to exploit the potentials of the sector

- To increase output, generate employment, diversify the revenue base, increase foreign exchange earnings and provide input for the industrial sector on a sustainable basis

According to the CBN, the key agricultural commodities to be covered under the scheme are cultivation of target crops (rice, cassava, cotton, oil palm, wheat, rubber, sugar cane, Jatropha carcus, fruits and vegetable), Livestock (dairy, poultry, and piggery), and fisheries.

Credit support to the target commodities shall be administered along the entire value chain of production, storage, processing, market and enterprise development.

For the purpose of this scheme, a commercial enterprise, according to the CBN, is any farm or agro-based enterprise with agricultural assets (excluding land) of not less than N350 million for an integrated farm with prospects of growing the assets to N500 million within the next three years and N200 million for non-integrated farms/agro-enterprise.

This however, does not apply to loans obtained by state governments for on-lending.

The Central Bank of Nigeria shall select, through a competitive process, the banks that will participate in the scheme with adequate considerations for the bank(s)' capacity, assets, branch network, liquidity, experience in agricultural lending, credit risk exposures, etc.

The banks bear the credit risk of the loans.

For this phase of the scheme, the CBN has approved two banks to administer the fund namely, United Bank for Africa, Plc (UBA) and First Bank of Nigeria, Plc (FBN)

For corporate and large-scale commercial farms/Agro-enterprises to participate in the scheme, the borrower shall be a limited liability company with asset base of not less than N350 million and having the prospect to grow the net asset to N500 million in the next three years and complies with the provision of the Company and Allied Matters act (1990).

The firm should have a clear business plan, provide up-to-date records on the business operation if any, have an out growers' programme, and where appropriate, satisfy all the requirements specified by its lending bank.

For medium-scale commercial farms/Agro-Enterprises to participate in the scheme the borrower shall be a limited liability company with asset base of not less than N200 million and having the prospect to grow the net asset to N350 million in the next three years and complies with the provision of the Company and Allied Matters act (1990), among others.

To participate in the scheme a state government/FCT shall submit an expression of interest to put in place appropriate institutional arrangements by setting up a secretariat (Special Unit or Agency) staffed with experienced agricultural experts and credit officers dedicated to the administration of the fund to be borrowed, which shall be approved by the PMC.

In addition, participants shall sign an irrevocable standing payment order (ISPO) in favour of the CBN, to deduct at source the total amount in default from the state(s) on a monthly basis of state revenue allocation on behalf of the PB.

The key stakeholders of the scheme include the federal government of Nigeria, Central Bank of Nigeria, Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Water Resources, Debt Management Office, participating banks, borrowers (farmers, Agro-Processors, marketers, state governments, and the FCT).

Next

Belgium and FAO link to help African farmers

Belgium has agreed to a $6.6 million programme for FAO to provide emergency assistance to poor farmers in Africa as part of an ongoing partnership that has totalled more than $80 million over the past twelve years.

Around $ 2.6 million of the latest contribution from the Belgian Development Cooperation will go to directly support farming households whose livelihoods have suffered from the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Cassava and sweet potatoes cuttings as well as hand tools, vegetable and other crop seeds will be distributed to 25,000 farmers. In addition, another 4,000 small farmers will receive backing to increase maize production in order to meet market demand. Producer associations will be given basic training in the use of machinery and how to repair warehouses and roads to enable harvested produce to be stored and transported away.

This part of the project will be implemented jointly with a World Food Programme “Purchase for Progress (P4P)”, also funded by Belgium. WFP supports local farmers by buying their products which is then distributed as food assistance to hungry people.

The Belgian donation to FAO will also assist returning ex-soldiers and farming households hit by floods and high food prices in neighbouring Burundi. They are to benefit from a $2 million programme that will help them return to farming. The rest of Belgium’s donation will go to support farmers in drought-stricken Niger and Ethiopia.

“Belgium is one of the most consistently supportive donors to FAO’s emergency work, something which is very much appreciated and its latest show of generous support will help improve the livelihood and food security of thousands of vulnerable people” said Laurent Thomas, Director of FAO’s Emergency Operations and Rehabilition Division.

Belgium has also recently contributed $900 000 to the FAO’s Special Fund for Emergency and Rehabilitation Activities which allows the agency to act swiftly in emergency situations. Since 1997, Belgium has financed more than 105 emergency and rehabilitation projects in over 20 disaster affected countries.

FAO

Project in Niger seeks to improve cowpea cultivation methods

by Isiyaku Ahmed

A project is underway in Niger to increase cowpea production by improving farming techniques. The effort is called the Gatsby Crop-Livestock Project, named after the London-based organization that is providing funding for the effort.

Among the implementers of the project is Niger's National Institute of Agronomic Research, the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, or IITA, and the US Peace Corps.

Cowpea farming in Niger is being hindered by a lack of arable land, poor crop varieties and outdated farming methods. About 80 percent of Niger's people are subsistence farmers and herders who use fallow farming techniques to grow cowpea. In this system, the land remains unplanted for a period of time so nutrients needed for healthy plants can regenerate in the soil. The system does not allow for the rapid growth of crops. Farmers also plant cowpea among crops with leaves that provide too much shade and thus impede its growth.
The older cowpea varieties are also susceptible to a parasitic plant called striga, which competes with the food crop for moisture and nutrients.

Dr. Hakeem Ajeigbe is the Gatsby Crop and Livestock project coordinator at IITA in Nigeria. He mentions another challenge faced by farmers: "Fertilizer is not available in the quantity required in Nigeria, Niger or anywhere in Africa. But we need fertilizer, so we are now teaching [farmers] how to use their livestock to generate manure."

But the new project by the IITA and the Ministry of Agriculture is working to turn the situation around. Dr. Hakeem says IITA scientists are introducing better yielding strains of cowpea that take 65 to 70 days to mature – nearly half the time of old varieties. They are also resistant to striga.

He says farmers are taught how to enhance regular commercial fertilizers. The animals eat crop residue for 60 to 70 days and generate manure that will be used to provide nutrients to the soil. The farmer digs a hole about 10 cm from the plant and puts a small amount of manure in it. This method, called spot application, reduces the amount of chemical fertilizers needed.

Hakeem says the IITA livestock project includes improved farming methods,"We have brought a new system, the strip cropping system, whereby the farmers can plant either one or two rows of cereals: four rows of cowpea. This creates a window for cowpea because with these four rows shading is minimized."

Dr. Addam Kiri Saidon is a soil scientist at an institution also involved in the effort, the National Institute of Agronomic Research of Niger (INRAN). He says Peace Corps volunteers from the United States will help train farmers in the regions of Maradi and Zinder in the new farming techniques and application of the new seed varieties. The collaboration is more on the transfer of technology working with the peace corps volunteers. They serve as a link between the project and farmers in the villages.

IITA is also helping with funds, new technologies, and some aspects of research. Niger produces nearly 700,000 tons of cowpea each year, making it the world's second largest producer, after Nigeria. It's the country's main agricultural export. It's also an indispensable part of the family diet, eaten as bean cakes and bean pudding. As West Africa's population grows, so does the demand for improved crops of the well-loved cowpea.

VOA

Niger River can irrigate 2.8 million hectares

The potential of irrigation of the basin of the Niger River is estimated at 2.816 million hectares, a survey on the cultivation of rice released by the West African Bureau of the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) said.

For Mali, the Office of Niger built in 1932 in the central delta of the river, covered a potential of around 1 million hectares out of hardly 150,000 hectares were exploited after more than seven decades, said the survey.

It noted that the objective of governments of the sub-region was to incorporate, as fast as possible, new dynamics of the cultivation of rice, taking into account the fact that the zone had abundant agricultural potentials.

Around 874 million hectares of Africa's land are considered as physically adapted to the agricultural production with the continent using only 4 per cent of this resource against 40 per cent for Asia, the document pointed out.

In the West African sub-region, the hydro resources estimated at 1,000 billion cubic meters of fresh water is renewed each year through the normal hydro cycle.

In spite of these assets, the study said in 2006, the countries of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) imported 7.2 million tonnes of rice, which was one-third of the world imports, at the cost of approximately US$ 1.7 billion.

The strong dependence on foreign countries in this field is a serious handicap on macro-economic stability in the West African sub-region.

Soaring prices of food products, in particular rice, over the first quarter of this year, triggered demonstrations in many of the countries of the sub-region.

Sub-regional rice consumption is in constant progression, approximately 9.6 per cent over the period 2001-2006.

The sub-regional production estimated at approximately 6.13 million tons in 2006 covered only 49 per cent of the sub-region's needs.

The principal rice producing countries of the sub-region are Nigeria, with 2.63 million tons, followed by Guinea with 898,000 tons, Sierra Leone with 711,000 tons and Mali with 682,000 tons.

Afriquenligne

Arab Bank loans Niger $10 million for construction of dam

The Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa (BADEA) and the Republic of Niger have signed a loan agreement for US$10 million to finance the first phase of the construction of Kandadji Dam in the country.

A statement from BADEA said the agreement was signed in Cairo, Egypt on 23 August, by the Director-General of the Bank, Mr. Abdelaziz Khelef, and the Nigerien Minister of Economy and Finance, Mr. Ali Mahaman Lamine Zeine.

The loan, which is repayable in 30 years (including a grace period of 10 years), has an annual interest rate of 1%.

The project aims at protecting the ecosystem of river Niger and ensuring availability of water supply throughout the year for irrigation of 2000 hectares of land in the first phase (to be increased to 31 thousand hectares by 2034) and for power generation.

The statement said the project would improve the food security and living standard of the people, thus helping to fight poverty.

With the loan, BADEA's total commitment to Niger up till June 2008 stands at US$77.402 million.

Afriquenligne

Niger, Mali source $400 million for dams

Niger and Mali have secured more than $400 million from mainly Islamic donors to build dams on West Africa's Niger river to generate power and help grow food for the largely desert countries, officials said.

Donors at a summit organised by the Islamic Development Bank last week in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, pledged $236 million to build a dam in Niger, and nearly $200 million for a similar project in neighbouring Mali, the two countries' governments said.

Home to one of the world's poorest and fastest-growing populations, Niger stretches deep into the Sahara desert.

It suffers frequent hunger crises exacerbated by widespread poverty and desert encroachment onto traditional farmland, and its economy depends largely on uranium mined in the arid north by former colonial power France.

"Funding for building the Kandadji dam and associated projects has been secured," Prime Minister Seyni Oumarou said after returning from Jeddah.

The government has been talking about building the Kandadji dam upstream from the capital Niamey for nearly four decades, but the Islamic donor funds should allow the first phase of the huge development project to begin in mid-2008.

The Niger river, crossing the extreme southwestern corner of the country on its way to Nigeria and the Atlantic, has a fertile flood plain ripe for irrigated agriculture and potential to reduce the country's huge dependence on imported electricity.

"Building the dam will allow us to solve at least three problems: firstly regenerating the natural environment, secondly improving food security through water-based agriculture or irrigation, and thirdly to provide electricity," Oumarou said.

However, the donor funding will cover barely a third of the projected 300 billion CFA franc ($670 million) cost of the broader Kandadji project, and Oumarou said the hydropower station itself would be financed through a public-private partnership. He said a dozen potential investors had expressed interest in the project, which would reduce Niger's dependence on neighbouring Nigeria's National Electric Power Authority, from which it imports much of its electricity needs.

Niger's economy depends heavily on uranium mined in the north, where Tuareg nomads have rebelled against government forces this year, killing dozens of soldiers. The government dismisses the rebels as drug traffickers and bandits. The dam site at Kandadji around 180 km (110 miles) northwest of Niamey, near Niger's borders with Mali and Burkina Faso, has not been affected by the rebellion.

Mali, whose economy is in better shape than Niger thanks to significant gold reserves and greater stability in recent years, plans to start work in 2008 on access roads and the following year on building a dam at Taoussa on the Niger river between the ancient Saharan trading cities of Timbuktu and Gao.

It too will provide hydropower and irrigation.

"In the first place, the Taoussa dam was a dream, but we have entered an era of ambition and today it is becoming a reality," President Amadou Toumani Toure said on Malian radio on Monday.

Reuters