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By Dr Ousman Gajigo
With the rainy season having ended, the Ministry of Agriculture recently announced the price they will offer to farmers for purchasing groundnuts. The announced price this year is D38,000 per tonne. This amount is too low. It significantly underpays farmers for the work done and provides no returns from months of hard work.
Groundnut is an internationally traded commodity, which means its price can be compared across many countries. Thankfully, the global price of groundnuts is easy to access. According to the World Bank commodity price database, the average price of groundnut in 2025 is $1,380 per metric tonne. When one compares this value to the price offered to Gambian farmers, it becomes quite clear that Gambian farmers are being significantly underpaid. Indeed, the price offered by the Gambian government is only half of the global price of groundnut when prices for shelled groundnuts are compared.
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Even without comparing the price to the world price, D38,000 per tonne is too low given the amount of work involved in groundnut cultivation. Groundnut cultivation starts with field clearing, continues into seed sowing, and includes multiple rounds of weeding and a demanding harvesting process. The work begins in June and ends in December, which means up to seven months of backbreaking work. For the average farmer with only a hectare of land, that means the farmer will receive no more than D5,000 per month of hard work. Given the size of the average household in rural Gambia and the high cost of living, such an amount is a pittance.
It is no wonder the production of groundnuts has plummeted under the Adama Barrow regime. The average annual rice production under President Jawara was over 112,000 tons per annum. Under President Barrow, it was over 99,000 tons per annum. Under President Barrow, it has fallen to about 43,000 tons. This dramatic fall in production is the result of declining returns to groundnut production under his regime.
This declining return to groundnut production is the inevitable result of lack of investments in this sub-sector and agriculture as a whole. The government’s whole intervention in the groundnut sector amounts to supplying some fertilisers at the beginning of the rainy season and offering low prices at harvest. This is no recipe for success in the agricultural sector.
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To add insult to injury, Adama Barrow decided to appoint Demba Sabally to the position of minister of agriculture. When you add an incompetent minister of agriculture to a leadership that is unserious, the only result is the aggravation of an already serious problem. Hence, the decline in groundnut production and deterioration in the agricultural sector as a whole.
It is time to turn around the agricultural sector. This must include making sure that farmers receive fair prices for all the crops they grow. It means addressing the problems they face in accessing inputs, land development, irrigation, storage and marketing. It means making sure that development projects that are intended for them actually reach them instead of benefiting just the president’s close friends.
