Emmanuel Ukudolo
Burkina Faso, April 23, 2016 – Burkina Faso, a small country in Africa whose economy depends largely on production and export of cotton is paying dearly for hastily switching to research based genetically modified(GM) cotton to boost production.
Bikaneri cotton is no longer competitive in the global market since they are low in fibre, leading to losses in income both to farmers and government.
To address the trend, government met at the highest level, Burkina Faso Minister of Finance, Madame Rosine Coulibaly, said at a press conference organised by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), in Washington.
“The government at the time, not our government, thought given that this is a very dry country that in order to increase cotton productivity, it was necessary to use the results of research, and that is why the government did adopt a goal for the genetically modified cotton.
“Afterwards, we realized that the length of fibers in the GM cotton doesn’t allow the Bikaneri cotton to remain as competitive as it used to be, and that is why the government met at the highest level and determined it’s not possible, we must not continue along this path, if a bad choice was made, we need to back track. So, the government decided to go back to conventional cotton’’, she said.
She added that the financial impact of the decision is $50 billion that needs to be found, $20 million in order to help the producers, because with the loss in price achieved by cotton, many farmers have been affected.
She said a bill has been presented to parliament to set aside $20 billion to support the cotton price for producers.
Beyond this, she said that going back to conventional cotton will require more imports. “It’s going to be fertilizer, pesticides, and this will require 30 billion CFA francs”, she said.
Also speaking at the event, Minister of Finance, Chad, Bourma Treye painted a dire situation about the economy of Chad. According to him, the drop in the price of oil has impacted negatively on the economy with growth for 2016 projected at 1.5 as against 13.6 in 2013.
One other problem he mentioned has to do with security challenges which has to do with Boko Haram on one hand and Daesh.
“This security situation has brought about a new problem because we are no longer able to trade with neighboring countries such as Nigeria.
“We have a major agricultural production. We have a large number of livestock in Chad which is usually traded with Niger, but right now, the borders are closed. On the one hand, we don’t have the oil income, and on the other hand, we have fiscal issues. These are some of the problems in Chad’’, he said.
