(Ecofin Agency) - In Burkina Faso, cotton producers expect to achieve a record production of 836, 000 tons at the end of the 2018-19 season. With this step the country hopes to reposition itself as the African leading cotton producer after being overrun by Mali this season.

“We can’t let it go this way. We refuse to be fall to the second place,” Tahirou Fofana, a producer, told RFI.

In this wake, the Burkinabe government will grant cotton growers CFA16 billion to facilitate access to inputs mainly fertilizers and insecticides.

Moreover, during the season under review, the producers will benefit from an agricultural insurance (allowing them to cushion natural calamities) and a project to establish make-up irrigation basins and develop plots with stone barriers.

Let’s recall that in this country, cotton is grown over nearly 800, 000 ha mainly by small-scale producers whose average farm size is 3.9 hectares, according to the USDA.

Espoir Olodo