The African Development Bank (AfDB) has approved $12.16 million in additional grant funding for the Rice Agro-Industrial Cluster Project (RAIC) in Sierra Leone.

The bank, in a statement, said the project was first approved in November 2021.

It said the new tranche, to be sourced from the 2022 Performance-based Allocation, will fill a funding gap in the project’s total cost of nearly $37 million.

‘In addition to bringing the country toward rice self-sufficiency, the project is improving the livelihoods of rural households by extending quality inputs, land and water management, mechanization and extension services to farmers to increase rice production’, the statement read.

The goal of RAIC is to contribute to rice self-sufficiency in Sierra Leone and improve the livelihoods of rural households.

The bank said the project is also improving the value chain through rice processing and promoting the consumption and marketing of locally processed rice.

Sierra Leone is one of the more important rice-producing and consuming countries in West Africa, and it was an exporter of rice in the early 1950’s.

Source: AfDB

Photo source: AfDB