With the largest population in Africa, and rapid urban migration, Nigeria is one of the largest rice importers in the world, and indeed has become dependent on food imports across the board—a situation the federal government is keen to reverse. While the GoN has mandated that each state work to increase domestic food production, the World Bank has also stepped in, partnering with the Ministry of Agriculture and Water Resources to develop the Commercial Agriculture Development Project for Nigeria (CADP), a six-year, USD$ 185m project, expected to finish at the end of 2014. CADP’s Team Leader and Senior Operations Specialist for the World Bank, Lucas Akapa, spoke recently about the project’s successful inclusion of SRI in Nigeria’s northern state of Kano, saying that adoption of SRI in the area has been a key part of helping raise yields throughout the region.

The CADP is active in five Nigerian states (Cross River, Enugu, Kaduna, Kano and Lagos), and covers two major components: agricultural production and commercialization, and rural infrastructure. According to their website, CADP’s objective is to “strengthen agricultural production systems and facilitate access to market for targeted value chains among small and medium scale commercial farmers in the five participating states. These value chains are rice, oil palm, cocoa, fruit trees, poultry production, aquaculture and dairy, with maize and rice as staples.” More information on the CADP can be found on the World Bank website, or on the CADP’s own project site.

For more information about SRI in Nigeria, visit our country page.