By Hassan I. Conteh

A group of farmers in Waterloo say some new kinds  of insects, green and brown in colour, have been damaging their plants especially the  maize crops.

The problem with these types of insects which is affecting  similar European crops is becoming the growing concern for farmers in Sierra Leone.

”The local seed crops (maize, beans,) are resistant to the infection caused by flies-carrying insects.

But the European seeds which mature within a three month period can be easily destroyed by these tiny insects,” says Joseph Kanu, a farmer at Firemanbo community  in Waterloo, Western Area Rural District, Sierra Leone.

The farmer’s thirty-year’s experience in farming and gardening has never seen such a destruction caused by these insects.

”We are faced with two notable challeges: we don’t get the money to buy fertilisers and local mulatium liquid which is helping  to kill these insects,” Kanu explains.

The mulatium liquid is the chemical which farmers and gardners often apply on crops especially maize to kill of ward off the insects.

But now, Kanu said, the cost on the chemical has risen dramtically, putting a jerry can gallon between Le 800, 000 and Le 1 million (old leones).”

Farmers in Sierra Leone, unlike in the past two decades, are now not being provided with seeds and fertilizers.

And the absence of them NOT being supported by government and other partners with the provision of seeds and fertilisers have rendered them to be largely unproductive.

Their relaxation from doing effective farming since they don’t get now the needed support such as free supplies of various seeds crops and fertilizers has slowed their output — and generally, farming and agriculture production in Sierra Leone.

”Many of us have not been getting any support from the Ministry of Agriculture and NGOs for the past years now. I could grow variety of crops such as cucumber, okara, beans, garbage and Chinese garbage, lettuce , white and red raddish, time, carrot, corni flower , pastri, etc. if the right support is there” says the farmer.

Kanu further said in the past, around 2004, they used to get European seeds and Chinese garbage from visiting tourists or investors who don’t eat the country’s local food.

”In those days, you would get most White people arranging a trip to Sierra Leone. So by that we the gardners back then at Gloucester village (in the capital) would grow them varieties of the vegetables and crops they like and could eat. But since those days they have not been coming as usual in the past into the  country again,” Kanu recalled.

”We get most of those overseas (European and Chinese) seeds to plant at Brookfields Multiplication Seeds Store in Freetown. Most of the seeds and fertilizers are from Holland/Netherlands,” he said.

Food insecurity around the world is threatening most countries and the African coninent is the hardest hit.

To prevent their domestic food from gradually running out, countries like India and Guinea, have recently, in the past month of July, banned the shipments of rice, corn, millet and varieties of similar food crops into other countries in the world.

As this sad phenomenon exists, local farmers in Sierra Leone now need continued support by the government to help them overcome insects killing their crops on farms and to get free supplies or lesser cost on ferlilizers to enable their plants grow rapidly and healthily.