Deconstructing the Barriers to Food Self-Sufficiency in Post-Conflict Sierra Leone

Abstract

Sierra Leone presents a profound paradox: a nation endowed with abundant agricultural resources, seven major rivers, extensive inland valley swamplands, and a climate ideally suited for rice cultivation, yet persistently dependent on food imports and burdened by alarming rates of food insecurity affecting over 80% of its population. This article undertakes a comprehensive deconstruction of the barriers to food self-sufficiency in post-conflict Sierra Leone, examining the complex interplay of historical legacies, institutional failures, gendered inequalities, and contemporary policy challenges that perpetuate this paradox. Drawing on a political economy framework and extensive analysis of agricultural policy since the end of the civil war in 2002, the study identifies six interconnected constraint clusters. There is the protracted legacy of conflict on agricultural systems and seed diversity; then land tenure dualism and the precarity of smallholder access; the responsibility-authority gap in gendered agricultural labour; the infrastructure deficit in processing, storage, and market connectivity; the tension between large-scale investment models and smallholder-centered approaches; and the political economy of rice import dependency. The analysis reveals that Sierra Leone currently produces some 65% of its domestic rice requirements while spending an estimated \$200 million annually on rice imports. The ambitious Feed Salone initiative seeks to remedy the situation through a \$620 million investment plan. However, this article argues that without addressing the underlying institutional and distributional challenges, the current strategy risks replicating the failures of previous agricultural development programmes by favoring agribusiness interests over the five million smallholder farmers in the country. The study concludes with recommendations for a sequential approach that prioritizes formalizing and strengthening existing informal agricultural practices, gradually expanding state recognition and resource allocation as smallholder collective bargaining power increases, and embedding food self-sufficiency within the broader framework of rural transformation and social justice.