Abstract
West Africa is one of the regions the most concerned with structural food and nutrition security. Consequently, agricultural development pathways and scenarios are under high scientific and political scrutiny in this region. Rice, as a rapidly growing staple plays a key role in the West African diet representing close to 40% of the total volume of cereal consumed in the region. In the context of the 2008 food price crisis several West African countries have since proclaimed rice self-sufficiency as a target. Here, we show that rice yields tend to be, on average over the entire region, less stable (by a range of 15%–30%) than that of alternative crops, possibly substitutable in diets. The regions where yields of alternative crops are more stable than those of rice correspond to the main climatic regions where these crops are grown: sorghum, millet in the Sahelian and Sudanian regions and tubers in the Guinean region. Rice yields are significantly less stable for 33% of the comparisons considered and are significantly more stable than any alternative crop for 15% of the comparisons in few areas without clear longitudinal patterns. Models accounting for climate variability explain up to 17% of the variance of the data and reveal that yield variability differences between rice and alternative crops tends to widen in the areas where the monsoon precipitation is more variable between-years. The highest levels of variability of rice yields compared to alternative crops are recorded in regions where the monsoon varies strongly between years. Our analysis advocates for an explicit account of yield stability in West African rice expansion scenarios and supply strategies.
Highlights
With a large fraction of structurally food insecure people, West Africa is one of regions of the world most concerned about food availability and access
Inconsistent relative levels of rice yield variability We estimate a yield variability difference between rice and each of the five alternative crops based on 261 SDR in 80 administrative level 1 areas over West Africa
We show that yields tend to be, on average over the entire region, more variable for rice than for the alternative crops
Summary
With a large fraction of structurally food insecure people (from about 11% in 2009 to 14% in 2019), West Africa is one of regions of the world most concerned about food availability and access. Strong population growth [2] and rapid urbanization [3], international food prices volatility [4], biotic and abiotic adverse conditions [5], climate variability and change [6, 7], and political instability or wars [7], affect both food availability and access under continuous demand growth This region is characterized by a relatively small diversity of plant-based foods [8, 9], and staples (i.e. cereals and roots and tubers) form the basis of food security and represent about 68% of the daily West African caloric supply [10]. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) proclaimed to target rice self-sufficiency in the region by 2025 [15]
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