Liberia’s Agriculture Minister Jeanine Milly Cooper has said the commercialisation of agriculture in that country was key to transforming the farming sector.
She was speaking at the ongoing cabinet retreat in Ganta, Nimba County.
Minister Cooper noted that despite the challenge of access to finance, Liberia’s Ministry of Agriculture had expanded cultivation of crops and livestock from small-holding to commercial scale to boost the sector.
She called for the exportation of cash crops as primary commodities, but stressed the need for industrialisation to add value to transforming agriculture.
The minister also pointed out to the Nimba Rubber Company exporting processed rubber from Liberia and the current construction of a rubber processing plant in Margibi County by Indian businessman Jeety will see the manufacturing of rubber tires in Liberia in the next few years and Firestone Liberia opening one of West Africa’s largest Ribbed smoked sheets plant in the country this year as some achievements by the Ministry of Agriculture.
Minister Cooper disclosed that with the support of primary egg importing company -UIC from Bomi County, 100 percent of eggs Liberians will consume at the end of 2022 will be produced in the country, while by early August, 27,000 layers will be flying in from the Netherlands.
“We have also set up a field mill at the Free Port of Monrovia to provide poultry and livestock fields to Liberian farmers in order for them to subsequently supply the rest of the country with eggs and chickens.”
The agriculture boss continues that Liberia now has the largest palm mill in the sub-region, Golden Sifca, which operates in Maryland County.
She said J-Palm, which produces honey, is expanding across the country.
However, she did not report on production of Liberia’s staple, rice and other food crops such as cassava, eddoes, among others.
Farmers in Liberia practice subsistence farming, which does not meet commercial demand.
