Seeds and survival: crop genetic resources in war and ... · Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Senegal, Slovak Republic, Sudan, Switzer-land, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda and Ukraine

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IPGRI

Inte

rnat

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Plant Genetic Resources Institute

IPGRI

A report commissioned by theInternational Plant GeneticResources Institute (IPGRI)and the Working Group onTechnology and AgrarianDevelopment,Agricultural UniversityWageningen

crop genetic resources in war and reconstruction in Africa

Paul Richards and Guido Ruivenkampwith contributions fromRoy van der Drift, MulbahGonowolo, Malcolm S.Jusu, Catherine Longleyand Shawn McGuire

A report commissioned by the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI) and the JointWorking Group on Technology and Agrarian Development, Agricultural University, Wageningen

with contributions from Roy van der Drift, Mulbah Gonowolo, Malcolm S. Jusu,Catherine Longley and Shawn McGuire

seedsand survival:

PB SEEDS AND SURVIVAL: CROP GENETIC RESOURCES IN WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION IN AFRICA

The International PlantGenetic ResourcesInstitute (IPGRI) is anautonomous internationalscientific organizationoperating under the aegisof the Consultative Groupon International AgriculturalResearch (CGIAR). Theinternational status ofIPGRI is conferred underan Establishment Agree-ment which, by March1997, had been signed bythe Governments of Algeria,Australia, Belgium, Benin,Bolivia, Brazil, BurkinaFaso, Cameroon, Chile,China, Congo, Costa Rica,Côte d’Ivoire, Cyprus,Czech Republic, Denmark,Ecuador, Egypt, Greece,Guinea, Hungary, India,Indonesia, Iran, Israel, Italy,Jordan, Kenya, Malaysia,Mauritania, Morocco,Pakistan, Panama, Peru,Poland, Portugal, Romania,Russia, Senegal, SlovakRepublic, Sudan, Switzer-land, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey,Uganda and Ukraine.

IPGRI’s mandate is toadvance the conservationand use of plant geneticresources for the benefit ofpresent and futuregenerations. IPGRI worksin partnership with otherorganizations, undertakingresearch, training and theprovision of scientific andtechnical advice andinformation, and has aparticularly strong pro-gramme link with the Foodand Agriculture Organiza-tion of the United Nations.

Financial support for theresearch agenda of IPGRIis provided by theGovernments of Australia,Austria, Belgium, Canada,China, Denmark, Finland,France, Germany, India,Italy, Japan, the Republicof Korea, Luxembourg,Mexico, the Netherlands,Norway, the Philippines,Spain, Sweden, Switzer-land, the UK and the USA,and by the Asian Develop-ment Bank, CTA, EuropeanUnion, IDRC, IFAD,Interamerican DevelopmentBank, UNDP and theWorld Bank.

CitationRichards, R. andRuivenkamp, G. 1997.Seeds and survival: cropgenetic resources in warand reconstruction in Africa.International Plant GeneticResources Institute, Rome,Italy

ISBN92-9043-349-3

PublisherIPGRIVia delle Sette Chiese 14200145 Rome, Italy

Copyright© International PlantGenetic Resources Institute,1997

PhotographsUnless otherwise stated,Catherine Longley took allthe photographs in thisbook, including that usedon the cover.

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This report was preparedduring April/May 1995 bystaff and associates of TAO(the Joint Working Groupon Technology and AgrarianDevelopment) of theWageningen AgriculturalUniversity and UniversityCollege London, (Depart-ment of Anthropology)under supervision of Prof.Dr. Paul Richards.

Contributors tothis reportRoy van der Drift:Dutch social scientist, witha research speciality inrural Guinea-Bissau;Mulbah Gonowolo:Liberian agronomist withexperience in refugeerehabilitation;Malcolm Sellu Jusu:Sierra Leonean plantbreeder researching plantgenetic resources of AfricanRice (PhD candidate, TAO/WAU);Catherine Longley: Britishanthropologist researching

farmer crop-selectionpractices in Sierra Leone(PhD candidate, TAO/UCL)Paul Richards:British anthropologistspecializing in indigenousknowledge systems (chair,TAO/UCL/WAU)Guido Ruivenkamp: Dutchsociologist specializing inthe development ofbiotechnologies (scientificsecretary, TAO/WAU).

Origin and intentThis report draws upon theresearch and personalexperiences of the variousauthors. It also reflectsdiscussions with repre-sentatives of variousagencies. We wouldespecially like to acknowl-edge the contribution tothese discussions of Inekevan Winden of the DutchInterchurch Relief organiza-tion (SOH) and Dr. JaapHardon of the Dutchgenebank (CGN,Wageningen). The concepts

presented here werediscussed at a meeting inJune 1995 with senior staffat IPGRI Headquarters,Rome. We thank PabloEyzaguirre, Toby Hodgkinand B. Landon Myer fortheir comments andeditorial suggestions.Financial support for thepreparation of the reportwas provided by theInternational Plant GeneticResources Institute (IPGRI).Opinions expressed arethose of the editors andcontributors alone.

The report is intendedto stimulate debate andfurther research on thelinked issues of seedsupply and geneticresource management inrural communities recover-ing from war, civil strife,and disasters. It deals withexperiences in three WestAfrican countries andcomplements other worksuch as the CGIAR ‘Seedsof Hope’ initiative.

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This report considers theimpact of war, civil strife,and low-intensity conflict(LIC) on plant geneticresource management,where crop plant geneticresources are still partly (ormainly) conserved in situby small-scale agricultural-ists. The following sets ofissues are covered: warand LIC and erosion ofplant genetic resources;relief, rehabilitation andmanagement of plantgenetic resources; policyand practical options to linkeffectively the fields ofrelief, rehabilitation andplant genetic resourcemanagement.The impact of war and LICon the management ofplant genetic resources istraced through linked casestudies of rice geneticresources in the ecoregionof the upper West Africancoastal zone from Senegalto Liberia. This zone hasbeen affected by threemajor conflicts: the war ofindependence in Guinea-Bissau, 1962-75, the civilwar in Liberia 1989-1996,and the insurgency of theRevolutionary United Front(RUF) in Sierra Leone,1991-97. The cases arerendered more significant,

executive summaryE from the perspective ofmanaging genetic re-sources, by the possibleimportance of long-termgeneflow between the localAfrican species of cultivatedrice and West Africancultivars of Asian rice.LIC has had a doublydisruptive effect on themanagement of plantgenetic resource in theWest African rice zone. Ithas damaged formal-sector(state-run) genetic resourcemanagement facilities, andequally importantly, hasbrought about majorchanges in the patterns ofsocial cooperation throughwhich local seed systemsare managed. The impacton the flows and distribu-tion of crop geneticdiversity is likely to beconsiderable but as yet isunquantified.In seeking to understandwar damage to seedsystems it is stressed thatplant genetic resourcemanagement is social aswell as technical work.Change in the interaction ofsocial and technical factorsmust be taken into accountwhen seeking to rehabilitateseed systems in theaftermath of war. Althoughseeds sometimes survive


conflict, there may bemajor shifts in patterns oflabour mobilization or incommercial relations ofagricultural production.These changes inagrarian social relationsare liable to profoundlyaffect the working ofseed systems. Rehabilita-tion solely directedtowards the restoration ofthe status quo may bemisplaced effort.The report considerssome of the ways inwhich seed issues mightbe effectively addressedin relief and rehabilitationactivity. Where informalseed systems havecollapsed, new allianceslinking refugee/displacedfarmer groups, reliefagencies and specialistsin managing geneticresources are needed.The report suggestssome ways in whichthese new actor-networksmight be fostered, whileavoiding dependency

Cimplications associated withconventional relief.Non-governmental Organi-zations (NGOs) and otherrelief and rehabilitationagencies operating in warzones address seed issues,and have some desire tofurther improve theirsociotechnical capacity inthis area. Some agencieswould welcome betterbriefing on both technicaland social dimensions ofseed-relief activity, includingsome background on theimplications for themanagement of plantgenetic resources.Institutions managing plantgenetic resources mustthemselves change to meetthe needs of these newclient groups. The reportdiscusses how genebankfacilities might open theirdoors to NGOs andrefugee and displacedfarmer client groups in war-torn regions. Somesuggestions includeimproving the socioeco-

nomic passport data foraccessions, ascertainingwhat relief and rehabilitationagencies need to knowabout seed issues,reorganizing genebankinformation systems tomeet these needs, anddeveloping the disasterpreparedness of genebankfacilities through jointexercises involving NGOpersonnel.Recent work on humanitar-ian assistance in Africanwar zones makes clear thatrelief aid must be designedagainst a sound back-ground analysis of thecauses of conflict, to guardagainst the danger of reliefaid fuelling further conflict.The report ends with anoverview of a modelscheme that seeks toaddress some of the basicfood-security needs of war-affected rural communitiesin the West African ricezone while taking accountof local conflict dynamics.

7contentsCNotes 3Executive summary 5

Chapter 1 War and crop genetic resources 9The importance of crop plant genetic resources 9The irregular distribution of crop plant genetic resources 9Unknown and forgotten crop types 10Changing patterns of war 10The size of the problem: the world’s current trouble-spots 10Rice genetic resources in West Africa 11War and rice genetic resources in the West African rice zone: general points 13

Chapter 2War and rice: three case studies 15Case Study One: Liberia 16Case Study Two: Sierra Leone 20Case Study Three: Guinea-Bissau 25Conclusions 29

Chapter 3Seed-relief assistance to war-damaged farming communities 31Relief and seeds in Liberia: a cautionary note 31Seed assistance to war victims in Sierra Leone 33Agricultural reconstruction: lessons from Guinea-Bissau 44Conclusions 47

Chapter 4The management of plant genetic resourcesand post-war recovery 49The existing framework 49How well does the current system function in war? 50Rethinking the role of genebanks 50Post-war management of plant genetic resources: practical initiative 56Conclusions 60

References 63Abbreviations and acronyms 64


9war and crop genetic resources1The importance ofcrop plant geneticresourcesGlobal food securitydepends on a relativelysmall number of staple foodplants. Currently rice andwheat are the two mostimportant. Crop plantimprovement has dependedon the management ofgenetic resources,historically throughprotection and selection byfarmers alone, and morerecently through manipula-tion by breeders drawingon modern genetic theory.Since science has nocapacity to create genes,agricultural progress willcontinue to depend on therational management of theworld’s existing stocks ofcrop plant genetic re-sources. Additionally, weshould note that in manypoor countries with a lowinvestment in science andtechnology, farmermanagement and selectioncomplemented by science-based plant improvementwill continue to be animportant aspect of thetotal management of plantgenetic resources. WestAfrica is one region rich incrop genetic diversity which

continues to suffer theeffects of war and civilstrife.

The irregulardistribution of cropplant geneticresourcesPlant genetic resources arenot distributed evenlyacross the planet. Thegreatest store of geneticvariation within a croptends to be found in theregions where wildancestors are to be found,and where some localcultivar groups (landraces)still exchange genes (andthus co-evolve) with naturalancestors. Some regions inwhich habitat diversity isespecially high are knownnot only for the geneticrichness of single cropspecies but also for cropspecies diversity. Theseregions were identified bythe Russian plant geneticistVavilov and are now named‘Vavilov Centres’ in hishonour. The managementof genetic resources inthese Vavilov Centres is amatter of great concern,and war and civil disloca-tion in such regions isespecially problematic.


Unknown andforgotten crop typesThe loss of plant geneticresources (genetic erosion),often accelerated by socialdislocation, is not lesssignificant in the case ofmore localized, lesserknown crops. Some ofthese crops may only bepartially domesticated, andlittle studied in the scientificliterature. A recent surveyof Africa, a continentnormally considered poor inplant genetic resources byworld standards, hasrevealed literally hundredsof crop types falling underthe headings of significantbut little studied orunknown and/or forgotten(Vietmeyer 1996). Thissource demonstrates thatAfrica is poor not in cropplant genetic resourcesthemselves but in docu-mented knowledge of suchresources accessible tooutsiders. Furthermore,world rankings of the lesser

crops fluctuate: cassava, forexample, has changed frombeing a regional staple inthe 15th century to a cropof world importance today.Some of the world’s currentneglected and partiallydomesticated crops mayone day assume muchwider significance. Currentprogress in geneticengineering increases thislikelihood. Thus there isgrowing acceptance of theidea that global foodsecurity depends on muchmore than protectinggenetic resources of high-profile crops in high-profilecentres of diversity.

Changing patternsof warThe post-Cold War worldhas seen an upsurge offorms of low-intensityconflict (LIC). This type ofwarfare involves vigilante orbandit-style militias fightingamong themselves oragainst regular state forces.

The recent increase in LICis a symptom of the statein crisis, especially in Africaand some parts of theformer Eastern bloc. InAfrica in particular, LICfeeds on rising numbers ofdisillusioned young people,in a fast-growing popula-tion, blocked in theiraspirations for educationand jobs. These youngpeople, part-educated, part-urbanized, tend to be asanti-peasant as they areanti-government (Richards1996a). Farming communi-ties and isolated govern-ment research stations areequally vulnerable to, attimes, barely coherentterrorist attack. Thus thespread of LIC damagesboth the in situ processesthrough which peasantfarmers maintain locallandrace materials and exsitu genetic resourceconservation in governmentresearch centres.

The size of theproblem: the world�scurrent trouble-spotsMore than three-quarters ofthe world’s armed conflictswere located in eithertropical and sub-tropicalregions or in rural areas

low-intensity conflict

This type of warfare involves vigilante or bandit-style militias fightingamong themselves or against regular state forces.

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the world�s armed conflicts

According to one estimate, the world in 1994was experiencing 23 major armed conflicts(defined as events with more than a 1000deaths per year) and 82 minor armed conflicts(events with less than 1000 deaths per year).

CHAPTER 1 WAR AND CROP GENETIC RESOURCES

Early African rice stillgrowing well in Poturu,Sierra Leone in 1992despite disruptions fromfighting

and agrarian communities.At least 11 of the majorconflicts and 30 of theminor conflicts wereconcentrated in the poorercountries of the tropicalzone, where geneticresource endowments tendto be both high and under-documented, and wherefarmer-managed in situprotection of crop geneticresources remains signifi-cant. Africa, a continent of49 exceptionally poorcountries with only weaklydeveloped formal proce-dures for managing ex situplant genetic resources,was especially badlyaffected by LIC, experienc-ing nine major insurrectionsor civil wars in 1994, inaddition to a number ofother more localizedinsurgencies.

Rice geneticresources in WestAfricaRice in West Africa is agood example of a localized

plant genetic resource ofpotential global significancethreatened by LIC. TheWest African rice zone isdefined as that region ofthe Upper Guinea coast,running from Senegal toCôte d’Ivoire, where rice isthe sole or major staplecrop. Here, farmers makeuse of two cultivatedspecies of rice - introducedAsian rice (Oryza sativa)and locally domesticatedAfrican rice (Oryzaglaberrima). Two probablewild ancestors of Africanrice are found growingalongside cultivated riceand may continue toexchange genes withcultivated African rice. O.glaberrima is almost entirelyrestricted to West Africa butoccasionally crosses withO. sativa. Some locallandrace populationscontain intermediate types.Genetic resources fromAfrican rice may beimportant for the futureimprovement of Asian rice,

upon which so much of theworld’s food securitydepends. The West Africanrice zone is a region witha population of about 15million people. It hasrecently experienced threemajor rural conflicts; theindependence struggle inGuinea-Bissau, 1960s-70s,civil war in Liberia 1989-96,and rebel insurgency inSierra Leone 1991-1997and a more localized ruralrebellion in the Casamanceregion of Senegal. Thethree remaining countries inthe rice zone, Côte d’Ivoire,Guinea andthe Gambia,have beenforced toabsorb largerefugeepopulations.

The WestAfricanrice zoneThe coastalrice zonefromCasamance(Senegal) totheBandamaRiver inCôte d’Ivoireshould bedistin-


guished from two otherWest African regions inwhich rice is important butnot the sole or majorstaple. There is the driersavanna from the SenegalRiver to Lake Chad, whererice is the major crop ofthe flood plains of thelarger rivers; and theforest-savannah transitionzone in Ghana andNigeria, where rice is amore recent commercialintroduction.

A basic agrarianfeature of the West Africanrice zone is that thegreater part of rural society(men and women, youngand old) is directly involvedin rice cultivation (Linares1981; 1992). This contrastswith the situation in thesavannah zone. Rice was

once cultivated ininhospitable riverinesettlements mainly byslaves; upland peasantsgrew dry grains (sorghumand millet). Today riverinerice is often a women’sspeciality crop (Carneyand Watts 1990).

The timing of thespread of O. sativa fromAsia to Africa is unknown.However, O. glaberrima isfound only in Africa, andmust have been domesti-cated by West Africanpeoples in ancient times. Alikely ancestor, the annualwild rice O. barthii (O.breviligulata), is wide-spread in wetlands fromthe Gambia to Lake Chad.The ancestry of O.glaberrima, complicated bygene transfer between wildand domesticated types inthe region, is not yet fullyunderstood. The recentdiscovery that African andAsian rice can besuccessfully crossedcontributes significantly toknowledge of rice geneticresources in the WestAfrican rice zone. It nowseems likely that duringseveral hundred years inwhich the two specieshave been grown side-by-side local landraces of

Asian rice may have beensignificantly modified byintrogression from Africanrice.

Models of ricedistribution in theWest African rice zonePorteres (1976) attempts toreconstruct a likely scenariofor the emergence ofAfrican Rice cultivation,drawing uponethnobotanical evidence.Porteres identifies threeareas of rice germplasmdiversity in West Africa: theInland Delta of the UpperNiger in present-day Mali,the Gambia-Casamance-Guinea-Bissau coastal-riverine zone, and theGuinea Dorsal whichcovers the watershedbetween the Upper Nigerand rivers draining to theAtlantic coast. Today, thesethree foci are associatedwith three distinct tech-niques for growing rice(Dresch, 1949): floodadvance and recessionagriculture in the InlandDelta (Harlan andPasquereau, 1969),estuarine wetland cultivationalong the coast (cf. Linares,1981, van der Drift, 1992),and dryland-wetlandcatenary cultivation on the

regional production environmentsof west Africa

The three main regional productionenvironments of West Africa are:● coastal wetlands rice cultivation,● riverine advance and recession agriculture,

and● forest dryland cultivation systems.They intersect in a triangle with its baserunning along the coast from the Sherbroestuary in Sierra Leone to Cape Mount in Liberiaand an apex around Kissidougou in Guinea-Conakry.

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CHAPTER 1 WAR AND CROP GENETIC RESOURCES

Case study -refugee assistance,LiberiaCase study -Balanta post-war recoveryCase study -Mede recoveryprog., Pujehun

Deep waterrice

Tidal-pumpedcoastalrice lands

West African ricezone(the zone of old-established rice cultivationin West Africa)

0 200 400 600km

Nigeria

Liberia

Sierra Leone

Guinea-Bissau

River Niger

Gulf of Guinea

20oN

15oN

10oN

5oN

Guinea Dorsal (Richards,1986).

However, Porteresnever collected rice inLiberia and Sierra Leone,and his model may beskewed by this omission.Richards (1995) proposesan alternative, less centric,scheme for the distributionof rice genetic resources inthe region (cf. Harlan,1976), assuming progresstowards domestication tohave been quite widelydistributed throughout theforest-savannah transitionzone in ancient times. Thisalternative model drawsattention to the significanceof the meeting and mixing

of germplasm from severalseparate ecospecificdomestications. Suchconvergence may havebeen widespread, butseems most likely to haveoccurred where the threemain regional productionenvironments intersect (seebox opposite, and map).

Farmers recognizeseveral local geneticresource hot spots withinthis triangle: one is the so-called Kissi pan-handle, andthe area around Bumpeh,south of Bo in SierraLeone. Local rice geneticresources may have beenfurther augmented by theintroduction of Asian rices

through early centres ofAtlantic trade in Sherbrocountry and at CapeMount.

War and rice geneticresources in the WestAfrican rice zone:general pointsWhichever model is taken,recent patterns of conflict inthe region overlay geneticresource hot spots in arather worrying fashion.Conflicts in Guinea-Bissauand Casamance disruptedfarming and seed systemsin the first of Porteres’secondary centres ofdispersal. The convergencemodel envisages a

Map of the study zone

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particular concentration ofhot spots along the SierraLeone-Liberia border. Thisregion has been especiallyseverely disrupted by theinvasion of Sierra Leone bythe Revolutionary UnitedFront (RUF) in 1991. Thegreatest loss of locallyadapted planting materialseems to have occurredwhere farming populationshave been repeatedlyuprooted by conflict, andseed stocks looted andburnt in recurrent fighting.This was the pattern on theLiberia-Sierra Leone borderfrom 1991. One encourag-ing feature, however, is thatdisplaced farming communi-ties in the region have notalways travelled far. Manyfarmers from KailahunDistrict sought refuge fromthe RUF in Guinea-Conakry, where local

farming practices havebeen continued in a regionrich in local landraces.

Dense refugeepopulations may actually bequite good for in situgenetic resource manage-ment, since there are morehands available to collectand sift material andgreater incentives to makeadaptive experiments. Thepossibility of measuringdirectly the genetic erosionin war zones is hard toimagine except for theuncommon existence of anadequate baseline data set.Rice researchers in SierraLeone have access to onesuch data set for ricegermplasm use in a villageon the Liberia-Sierra Leoneborder in 1989 (Davies andRichards 1991). However,for the most part an indirectapproach is the only one

feasible. Molecular methodsoffer ways of testinghypotheses about patternsand processes of thedistribution of rice geneticresources in the region.Recent work on O. sativa,O. glaberrima andpresumed ancestors, usingtechniques of isozyme andDNA analysis, confirms theseparate evolution of O.glaberrima as a cultivar andthe plausibility of arelationship with O. barthii.In the future it may bepossible to use suchtechniques (cf. Dally andSecond 1990; Glaszmann,1987, 1988) to clarify theancestry of differentvarieties and establishbaseline indices of geneticvariability within localpopulations.

Members of a Limbafarm household(headed by KaramokoSaidu Kamara) on theupland rice farm, wherebunches of harvestedrice have been left todry on the tree stumps.

15war and rice:three case studies2 The three country case

studies described heresuggest some of the typicalconsequences of war forfarmer-based seed systemsin the West African ricezone. It is important to notethat seed systems aresociotechnical ensembles;this chapter shows thatdamage to the social fabricof a seed system is assignificant as direct physicalloss of seeds. The threecase studies illustrate thispoint in different ways.First, the Liberian casestudy illustrates the directpractical consequences ofwar for the basic function-ing of seed systems. Wardeprives farmers of thebasic raw materials forfarming. When conflict isgeneral, or prolonged overseveral seasons, possibili-ties for recovery throughlocal action are veryseverely limited. Thesecond case, drawn fromexperience in Sierra Leone,focuses on the micro-socialdynamics of seed systems.Attention is drawn to thefact that farmer seedsystems depend on trustand tacit understandingamong neighbours.Combatants in African LIC

deploy techniques intendedto destroy trust because adivided and dysfunctionalcommunity is more readilyexploited by lightly armedguerrilla bands living off theland. Such warfare is in thewords of one Mozambicanofficial ‘anthropological’. Asa result, informal seedsystems may cease tofunction. The final casestudy in Guinea-Bissaubrings out a third point: thatwar affects different socialgroups in different ways.Conflict may accelerate ortrigger substantial socialchange. It may, forexample, disrupt estab-lished control by the oldergeneration of the labour ofthe younger generation,with implications (as inGuinea-Bissau) for laboursupply in rice agriculture.Rehabilitation of seedsystems thus may meanmuch more than restorationof a prewar status quo. Itmay mean thatagrotechnical options haveto be fundamentallyreassessed. A recoveringcommunity may need notonly recovery of lostcultivars but also access tonew materials from whichto fashion, by selection and


adaptation, cultivarsadapted to radically alteredpost-war farming conditions.

Case-study One:Liberia

Civil war in LiberiaInsurgency in Liberia beganon 24 December 1989 inrural Nimba County innortheast Liberia andspread rapidly to all partsof the country. The core ofthe insurgency was a smallgroup of 100-150 fighters,the National Patriotic Frontof Liberia (NPFL). Thespecific aim of the NPFLwas to overthrow theregime of Samuel Doe andinstall NPFL leader CharlesTaylor as president. ManyNPFL recruits wereconscripted from among theyouth of rural NimbaCounty, a region known tobe strongly opposed to theDoe regime. This trans-formed the NPFL into amovement with a strongethnic character, later to beopposed by other ethnicallybased movements usingsimilar recruitment andinsurgency tactics. At onestage the NPFL controlledup to 90% of rural Liberia,with only Greater Monroviabeyond its direct control,

but the rural districtssubsequently becamedivided between severalcompeting armed factions.Many rural Liberians,unarmed and defencelesslow-resource farmers,adhered to none of thesefactions, but found lifeimpossible when menacedby marauding gangs of ill-disciplined and often veryyoung fighters. Combatantswere given only rudimen-tary training in skills ofguerrilla warfare, andelaborated for themselves arange of dirty tricks andbizarre punishments suchas the ‘tabay’, a form oftorture with soaked ropestightening upon the victimas they dried, to terroriselocal rural populations intosubmission. Field com-manders were often youngteenagers and the idea thatwar had rules, other thanthose they chose to inventfor themselves, came as asurprise. Faction leaderswere often quite ignorant ofthe atrocities being carriedout in their names, andoverall control of combatexercized by Taylor and hisrivals was at times onlynominal. In this climate ofunpredictable and uncon-trolled violence it is not

surprising that a largeproportion of the populationof rural Liberia soughtrelative safety either inGreater Monrovia or asrefugees across theinternational borders inSierra Leone, Guinea andCôte d’Ivoire. Agriculturalproduction was effectivelyhalted in large parts of ruralLiberia, as up to a millionpeople - well over half therural population of prewarLiberia - found themselvesliving as refugees.

The direct impact ofwar on farming inLiberiaPrior to the war, smallfarmers relied primarily ontraditional rice farming andother cash-crop cultivationto earn income. Theescalation of the civil wardestroyed markets andmade it physically toounsafe to farm. Subsistenceactivities, the basis oftraditional rice production inrural Liberia, came abruptlyto an end when the farmingcommunities were dis-placed, sometimes fleeinginto Côte d’Ivoire andGuinea. Farmers withoutkin in these two countrieswere forced into neighbour-ing villages with the hope

17CHAPTER 2 WAR AND RICE

that the conflict might soonbe resolved. Othersremained in rebel-capturedareas, but were unable tofarm for fear of counterat-tack.

Hunger was soon apressing concern in bothrural and urban areas; foodshortages worsened due tothe predatory actions ofcompeting factionsmounting road blocks onmajor transportation routes.Wage, festive andreciprocal labour, the mainsources of labour fortraditional farmers, quicklybroke down. Few farmershad money to pay wages.It seemed too foolhardy tocontribute to reciprocallabour arrangements whenfrom day to day it wasuncertain whether or notsocial groups wouldbecome scattered byfighting.

In the turmoil ofsudden and vicious attack,many Liberian farmers fledtheir farms, frequentlyabandoning all theirbelongings including farmimplements and storedseed. Initially, much seedrice was lost not to lootersbut to animals and moisturein abandoned farms. Thosefarmers lucky enough to

save some plantingmaterials were forced touse seeds for food becauseof the general economicchaos in war-blightedareas. Others sold whatlittle seed they had left,tempted by vastly inflatedmarket prices for food. Inborder regions manyfarmers sold plantingmaterials with the specificintention of acquiringenough money to moveover the border into Côted’Ivoire, Sierra Leone orGuinea. Even farmers whodecided to stay put found itpreferable to sell plantingmaterials to avoid constantharassment from hungrymilitias, now victims of theeconomic chaos they hadcreated. Rebel forces andother displaced peoplewould roam the villages insearch of stored rice seed.The gun was a passport toany food item the hungrymilitia fighter required.Soon, therefore, combat-ants had eaten their waythrough subsistencefarmers’ stored rice,including planting materialscarefully selected andpreserved for their highadaptability to local plantingconditions. Lofa, Bong,Nimba and Grand Gedeh

counties, once among themain rice-producing areasof Liberia, were soonreduced to an agriculturalstandstill, through randomterror attacks, suddendisplacement of populationand subsequent near totalloss of locally adaptedgermplasm.

Impact ofdisplacement onfarmer-basedmanagement of plantgenetic resourcesThe displacement of thecivilian population andfarmers has a fundamentalimpact on local manage-ment of plant geneticresources because thelabour supply is disrupted,thus rendering manyroutine agricultural activities,including labour-intensiveseed selection, storage andexchange, impossible.Widespread fear of attacklimited farming to smallplots close to villages, orsecluded ‘corners’ in theforest well away from mainroads and paths. The vastmajority of Liberian civilianswere too terrified to farm.Most preferred to seeksafety in refugee camps orcities, depending upon theavailability of relief foods,


rather than risk farming inthe bush unprotected. Themultiplication of militiagroups in Liberia (atmaximum eight), absenceof regular uniforms andrecruitment of part-urbanized school dropoutsand the young unemployed,meant that it was oftenimpossible to distinguishbetween friend and foe,even where groupsmaintained some nominalethnic or regional alle-

giances. Groups recruitednew fighters by capture,and any conscript temptedto refuse would either bekilled or forced into slavery.Militias needed slaves toundertake carrying tasks, orto fell the trees, slaughterwildlife, and dig thediamonds through whichthe factions gained thecash needed to buy furthersupplies of arms andammunition.

Where displaced

civilians were willing tofarm they lacked the toolsnecessary to start again innew locations. This strictlylimited the amount of land,and more importantly, therange of land typescultivated, with a knock-oneffect on the types of riceplanting materials incirculation. Where theyhave insufficient tools andlabour for a fully diversifiedfarm enterprise, farmerssee no merit in struggling

War empties people fromforests and brings backwild animals. Thisleopard was killed aftermenacing farmers onland adjacent to GolaForest on the Liberianborder of Sierra Leone in1992

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to keep up the range of thetypes of local seednecessary for the morespecialized rice-cultivationenvironments. The impactis that the more specializedvarieties are soonestconverted to food. Underlocal seed storage practicesthere is a definite limit tothe viability of seed, andfaced with a conflict with noapparent end in sight manyfarmers found it rational toconvert rice seed stocks tofood, to deal with theimmediate hunger crisis.There was a generalattitude of “hoping for thebest”, and that it would bepossible to recover relevantseed types at some futurepoint when peace hadbeen restored.

Refugee farmers thenencountered a range ofproblems in their attemptsto grow rice in their newenvironments. Perhaps thebiggest hindrance was asimple lack of land. Manydisplaced Liberian refugees,having crossed into Guineaor Côte d’Ivoire, wereprevented from farming.The Guinean and Ivorianfarmers, beginning toexperience some degree ofland hunger themselves,suspected that the

displaced Liberians hadentered their countries notas refugees but with theexpress intent of takingover their farm land.Persistent refusal of theGuinean and Ivorianfarmers to provide thedisplaced Liberian farmersor refugees with arableland left Liberian farmersunable to undertake anyagricultural activities. Thosedisplaced farmers who hadagainst all odds managedto preserve some seed forplanting were then facedwith no alternative but toconsume the seed theyhad carefully transported totheir new locations. It isinteresting to note thatLiberian refugees foundvillagers in Sierra Leonemuch more accommodat-ing, and many were evenwelcomed (at first) andassisted to settle withinvillages in the border zone,as normal farmingstrangers rather than ascamped refugees. The roleof Charles Taylor and theNPFL in assisting the RUFto invade Sierra Leonechanged local perceptionsof Liberian refugees, thoughan accommodating attitudestill prevailed in someparts.

For the farmers whodid secure land, seedchoice became a newproblem. Refugee farmersoften meet new andunfamiliar soil types, aswell as new pests anddiseases problems. Theadapted varieties of ricewith which they are familiarmay not be appropriate tothe new local conditions. Inresponse to poor harvests,displaced farmers oftendecide to abandon anyvarieties they bring withthem and quickly adopt riceselections appropriate tothe new locale. In effectthey are abandoning thevarieties that they may oneday need to resettle theirhome villages.

Finally, it should beemphasized that manyfarmers are not refugees inthe strict sense, but areinternally displaced personswithin Liberia. Thesedisplaced groups are oftenin a particularly weakposition because they sufferthe disadvantages ofenforced removal (e.g. lossof locally adapted plantingmaterials), but are stillhighly vulnerable tointimidation by youngfighters. Internally displacedfarmers frequently do not


even attempt to growcrops, relying instead onwhatever feeding pro-grammes are available.Why bother, when fighterssteal crops for provisions;or when farms have to berepeatedly evacuated dueto resurgence or rumouredresurgence of fighting. It isto be anticipated that inareas with large numbersof internally displacedvillagers, loss of localgermplasm is especiallyhigh.

The impact of the waron managing plant geneticresources in Liberia isrelatively simple tosummarize. Due to lack ofland and farm labour, andloss of suitable seedthrough abandonment,consumption or theft, thestock of indigenous ricecultivars became highlydepleted over seven yearsof conflict ranging overnearly all parts of thecountry. Even when stored,local rice seeds rapidly loseviability in humid, tropicalconditions. Farmer-basedgenetic resource manage-ment systems may bebeyond revival withoutoutside help in several ofthe areas most badlyaffected by population

displacement. Whether ricecultivation can ever returnto the same environments,and under the sameproduction systems, nowthat a fragile peace hasbeen restored, remains tobe seen. Almost certainly,old rice varieties havedropped out of production,but many of the moreimportant types may berecovered from collectionsor chance survivals. Thereis also a question as tohow well prewar varietieswill meet farmers’ needs innew post-conflict agricul-tural situations. However,this does not mean thatLiberian rice agricultureshould be subject to arapid externally drivenprogramme for the transferof exotic planting materials.Liberian farmers werebefore the war skilled inselecting and adapting ricelandrace materials to suittheir changing needs. Post-war, the issue is notrecovery of old seedsversus introduction of newseeds. Farmers may haveabandoned or lost familiarseeds, but so far we havefound no evidence, or seeany reason to suppose,that war has causedLiberian farmers to lose

their capacity to select. Itmay be more important toconsider how best tosupport farmer seed-selection capacities, andhow to provide the rightkind of mix of old and newmaterials upon which thisintact adaptive capacitymight be exercised.

Case-study Two:Sierra LeoneThe main feature of theLiberian case study was ageneral disruption of rurallivelihoods due to conflict.With half or more of therural population displacedlocal seed systemsexperienced massivedisruption. The early stagesof the related insurgency inSierra Leone, a spill-overfrom fighting in Liberia,were less intense, andthere was a partialagricultural recovery oncethe initial RUF invasion waschecked. The Sierra Leonecase introduces us to someof the subtler damagesustained by seed systems.A local seed system ismore than just seeds andstorage. It also comprisesthe practices, knowledgeand social relations whichfarmers use to promote theusefulness of crop genetic


resources. These elementsare especially vulnerable todisruption where insurgentsaim to control civiliansthrough terror tactics. Tofully understand the natureof the damage sustained byseed systems as a result ofthe RUF invasion we mustfirst attempt to characterizesuch seed systems andexplain how they functionedin Sierra Leone duringperiods of peace andstability.

Community seedsystems in SierraLeoneThere are many similaritiesamong the cultures andpractices of rural rice-farming communities acrossLiberia, Sierra Leone andGuinea-Bissau. Accordingly,this description of village-level management of plantgenetic resources in SierraLeone may be regarded asapproximately applicable toother parts of the WestAfrican rice zone as well.The data have beencollected over a 15-yearperiod monitoring localseed systems and havecontributed to the followingcase study.

Farmers actively andconsciously manage plant

genetic resources bycollecting and screeningunfamiliar rice plantingmaterials. Locally this isdescribed as experimenta-tion, and farmers know thatoff-types are more oftenfound in edge-reapedmaterial (where spontane-ous outcrossing with anadjacent variety is morelikely). Some farmersconsciously interplantdifferent types (e.g. Africanand Asian rices) in a singleplot, in the hope of reapinghybrid material (Longley

and Richards 1993).At any one timefarm householdstypically deploybetween two and sixdistinct riceselections adaptedto the main on-farmecologies and soiltypes.

The number ofdistinct rices in anyone average-sizedvillage (of 250-500people) totals about20-40 types; nation-

changes in farmer�s seed selection

Only 46% of rice in 1987 was planted byfarmers planting the same variety in 1983. Inother words, farmer change of seed selection1983-7 was the norm rather than theexception.

Farmers fleeing withtheir belongings in theface of a rebel attack.Kambia District, SierraLeone, January, 1995.


wide, farmers in SierraLeone make regular use ofperhaps as many as 500 ormore varieties, in a numberof ecospecific landracegroupings. Duration andadaptation to flooded orrainfed conditions tends todetermine where landracegroupings are used (onearly planted run-off plots,in inland-valley swamps, inseasonally flooded riverine

grasslands, on rain-feduplands).

In a country-widesample survey (1987)formal sources (i.e.projects) accounted for only6% of rice seed acquisi-tions. A further 19% of riceseed was acquired throughlocal purchases. Loans-in-kind from rice merchants

accounted for a further19%. But 55% of all seedrice came through informalnon-market sources(including exchange 30%,and gifts or loans fromfriends and kin, 19%). Mostseed acquisitions describedas gifts from friends or kinwere in fact loans-in-kindfrom patrons to clients,under the customaryarrangement of one bushel

at planting time for two atharvest (lonei hou, inMende). Of local gifts,purchases, loans andexchanges, 37% camefrom friends and neigh-bours, including patrons,and 24% from relations. Itis considered courteous topass on small amounts ofany interesting seed

acquisition to friends andkin so that they canexperiment for themselves.Anything interesting buthard to acquire is likely tobe backed up by giving itto friends or kin in anotherneighbourhood, to helpensure that it can berecovered in case of loss.This behaviour underlinesthe importance of farmer-to-farmer exchange, and

informalprocessesmore generally,as the principlemeanswherebyfarmerscirculate ricegeneticresources andgain access tonew material.

Adetailed studywas made over5 years in the

village of Mogbuama,Moyamba District, centralSierra Leone. Work wasbased on a completeinventory of varietiesplanted on all rice farms inthis escarpment-foot villagein 1983, and a resurvey ofrice varieties planted in1987. The study showedcontinuity in the overall

Limba farmers(Karamoko SaiduKamara and colleague)packing dried,harvested rice bundlesinto a biri on an uplandfarm, where it will bekept for severalmonths.


pattern of variety use overthe 5 years, but manydetailed changes. Abouthalf of all household farmsplanted the main 4-monthupland rices exclusively(though often in catenarysequences, with the earliestplantings on lower slopes).The remainder - largerhouseholds with diversifiedlabour supply - plantedadditional 3-month varietieson lower slopes and 5-month varieties in swamps.Altogether, 5-monthvarieties covered 3-5%, and3-month varieties 12-15%of the total rice area. Inboth years about 40% ofrices were planted on riverterrace soils.

Within this stablegeneral framework,important changes wereevident in variety use.Some change resulted fromfarmer mobility between1983 and 1987, as migrantfarmers moved in and outof the village with theirfavourite varieties. Changeof variety was alsorecorded in 53 out of atotal of 59 farminghouseholds present in both1983 and 1987 surveys.Many of these changeswere the result of deliber-ate adaptive choice.

Excluding all long-durationswamp rices put by farmersunder the undifferentiatedcategory name yaka,households in both surveysplanted 37 named varietiesin 1983, including 24 4-month upland types andfour 3-month varieties, and32 varieties in 1987,including 19 4-monthupland types and five 3-month varieties. 17% of allrice land (by area) in 1987carried varieties notcultivated in 1983. Varietiesno longer under cultivationby 1987 covered 15% ofthe rice area in 1983. Turn-over rates, assessed byfarmer, were even higher.Only 46% of rice in 1987was planted by farmersplanting the same variety in1983. In other words,farmer change of seedselection 1983-87 was thenorm rather than theexception.

These results (see boxabove) bring out clearlythat in normal conditionsfarmers in Sierra Leonemostly acquire anddistribute rice seeds viainformal channels. Farmingrequires ceaselessexperimentation with newselections and adaptationof old favourites to new

farming conditions. Farmersmaintain crop geneticresources by a managedprocess of crop evolution.The key to this process isthe ability to exchange andmove locally developedgermplasm within theagroecosystem.

Social factors and theinformal seed systemThe head of the householdgenerally bears the mainresponsibility for managingmajor transactions in theseed system . Heads ofhousehold expect to storeseed rice for next year’splanting, and to negotiatebulk seed loans orexchanges. Males headmost (85-90%) of the SierraLeonean farming house-holds, so decisions aboutseeds tend to be a malepreserve. However,harvesting is an activitydivided evenly betweenmen and women, and thesenior women of thehousehold are responsiblefor seed managementduring the harvest(including roguing of off-types). Women alsoreserve seed for use ontheir own private rice plots.The harvest is mainly soldto replenish personal

Factors influencing seed selection

Farmer change of seed selection 1983-87was the norm rather than the exception.Three sets of factors may account for thesechanges:● involuntary changes

(e.g. seed rice consumed in a period ofsevere hunger and replaced by a loanfrom a neighbour);

● voluntary changes(e.g. to match a variety to conditions ona newly cleared farm, or replace mixedseed); and

● changes resulting from successful trialswith new material.


savings or small stocks oftrading capital. Womenperform all threshing tasks.The decision to roguemixed harvested materialmay be taken by women ifthey suspect later process-ing difficulties; somevarieties are especially hardto clean for cooking.Women are especiallyknowledgeable about ricevariety differences relatedto processing and cooking(cf. Gay 1989). Womensometimes reserve off-typesfor experimentation,especially material suited tothe wetland environmentswhere they tend to planttheir private rice for cash.Women arealso assiduous exchangersof planting materials forexperimentation, valuingseeds as small tokens ofeveryday friendship andsocial solidarity.

Women’s involvementin seed management needsto be underlined for ruralcommunities from the GolaForest, on the Liberia-SierraLeone border, eastwardsinto Liberia, where men areless involved in plantingand harvesting activitiesthan in central SierraLeone. Gay (1989)considers women to be the

main seed selection expertsamong the Kpelle innorthwest Liberia. Seedexpertise seems to berelatively less genderedamong groups such as theKpa-Mende and Temnefurther west in SierraLeone.

In general, it isimportant to note thatinformal seed systems,through which rice landracepopulations are maintainedand improved, depend verymuch on maintainingcommon courtesies andconfidences of village sociallife. People make tokengifts of seed to each otherand loan serious amountsof seed for plantingbecause they haveconfidence, that in arelatively settled and stableworld, they will receive areturn, or that one goodturn will deserve another. Inshort, the informal seedsystem only works whenthe informal socialinstitutions of village liferemain in working order.

War, seeds and trustPhysical destruction is anobvious serious conse-quence of war. The Liberiacase illustrates graphicallyhow war results in direct

loss of seed. Lightly armedinsurgents burnt housesand barns rather thanwaste bullets, and manysecret stores of seed ricewent up in flames. Rebelsand soldiers fed from theland, looting and eatingseed set aside for planting.But beyond such physicallosses, war corrodes thesocial confidences uponwhich informal seedsystems rest. In SierraLeone the RUF found nonatural allies in thecountryside. Enclaved inforest wilderness themovement’s leaders taughtprinciples of guerrillawarfare reflecting theexperience of movementslike Shining Path in Peruand Renamo in Mozam-bique. These lessonsincluded instruction in thestrategic advantage ofdividing a hostile citizenrythrough trying to rake upthe embers of old quarrels.RUF cadres sometimescarefully spied out ruralcommunities, painstakinglycompiling information onwhich families were party tochieftaincy or land disputes,perhaps noting meanwhilewhich households wereMuslim, which Christian,etc. In the course of an


RUF attack, cadres mightseek to involve disgruntledparties in a chieftaincydispute, by prompting themto carry out violent acts ofrevenge. Or the houses ofonly Christians, or onlyMuslims, might be burnt ina raid. The RUF did nothave a religious pro-gramme, but such actionsdivided neighbour againstneighbour and made iteasier for a numericallyweak and lightly armedenemy secreted in nearbyforest to maintain futurecontrol over civilians hostileto the RUF cause. It iscommon to find that thesesocial wounds are veryslow to heal. Householdswhere one or two youngpeople were suspected ofjoining in a looting spreeafter an attack might findthemselves excluded fromlabour-sharing arrange-ments, weakening agricul-tural efficiency andcollective food security.Much of the everydayconfidence upon which theseed system restsevaporates in the face ofthe dirty tricks deployed bymodern exponents ofsociologically smart low-intensity guerrilla conflict. Itfollows that rehabilitating

the seed system is not onlya technical matter, but mustalso tackle crucial socialissues, such as howneighbours might beencouraged to begin tocooperate once again.

Case Study Three:Guinea-BissauThe third case study shiftsattention to themacrosociological contextwithin which seed systemsoperate. War often bringsprofound economic andsocial changes. The patternof post-war recovery in theagrarian economy ofGuinea-Bissau renderedprewar agrarian technologyinappropriate. Plant geneticresource management mustrespond actively to thesechanges. New technicalchoices may be needed,based on careful analysisof basic changes withinsociety and economy.

The impact of theGuinea-Bissauliberation war onmangrove riceThe 12-year independencewar, from 1962-1974,particularly affectedmangrove rice farming, themain source of foodproduction in Guinea-

Bissau. As might havebeen expected, riceproduction decreasedsignificantly during the war.However, production furtherdecreased in the periodafter the war ended,contrary to expectations forpost-war recovery and inspite of the introduction ofspecific rehabilitationprojects. To understand thisphenomenon, it is neces-sary to understand the wayin which the socialorganization of mangroverice farming changed associety was reconstitutedafter the war.

Post-war rehabilitation Young man (AranfanDumbuya) transplantingrice seedlings into aswamp.


efforts emphasized aparticular rice variety: salt-tolerant ROK5 developedby Rokupr Rice ResearchStation in Sierra Leone forshort-season mangrovefarming regimes. Thiswould have been feasiblehad post-war agriculturallabour organizationimmediately returned toprewar conditions. But warchanges many things, andin this case it had a majorimpact on householdorganization and with itlocal labour supply. Thesealtered labour conditionsrequired a differentemphasis in supply of ricevarieties, with greateremphasis on non-mangroveenvironments.

The history ofmangrove rice farmingThe main rice producers inGuinea-Bissau are theBalanta who make up 32%of the population. Theirfarming practices, whichhave considerable historicprecedent, are mostlyorganized on the villagelevel and around age andgender distinctions. In theearly 1890’s young Balantamen from the central regionof Oio started seasonalmigration to new,

unexploited mangroveareas south of the RioGaba.

Extended families andeven entire villages werethe major production units.Mangrove-rice farmingrequires large labourgroups that can bedeployed at specific pointsin the agricultural cycle. Tomeet this demand, thepatrilineal family compound,pang, was the major sourceof labour input, land andharvest management. Arange of genetic materialwas used that was adaptedto differences in quality ofthe parcels within the landallotments. These generallyranged from upland plots(sweet or male) to lowerswampy and tidal fields(salt or female) fields. Thediversity in the cropgermplasm also enabledfarmers to cope with widefluctuations in the timingand volume of the rains.

The elders wereresponsible for theselection, separation andstocking of the seeds fromthe entire harvest. As apart of this selection, smallexperiments were executedon variety, seeding andtransplanting methods intransition zones from one

type of soil to another, inrelation to the actual orexpected rainfall. Localknowledge, and themobilization of the labourpotential, were major pillarsof the mangrove ricefarming system. Howeverthe large-scale developmentof rice farming in southernGuinea-Bissau, from the1890s onwards, was onlypartly based on theexpertise and dynamics ofthe Balanta. Largelyunderestimated was thefact that the rapid expan-sion of rice farming,corresponding to a massivemigration movement ofBalanta from the centralOio regions westward tothe regions of Cacheu andQuinara, and south towardsTombali, was stimulatedand partly organized bycolonial entrepreneurs,known as ponteiros. As theshift away from the slave-trade towards agriculturalexploitation in Guinea-Bissau was seen to beirreversible, these colonialentrepreneurs made pactswith traditional landlords,and opened new territory tomigrants, called pontas.

Eventually, the Balantatook over the land andlabour management of rice

the impact of war

the impact of war on local seed systems andmanagement procedures of plant geneticresources is both direct through looting anddestruction of seed reserves and indirect, viachanges in social organization, as communitiesdisplaced by war attempt to regroup.


production while theponteiros focused ontrading and seed manage-ment. Balanta weresupposed to sell their riceto the ponteiros, to whomthey also turned forassistance in times ofscarcity. Ponteiros becamea regular source of ricecredit. Shaping local valuesthrough commerce (whiterice was ‘good rice’ andlocal red rice came to beregarded as pig food), theybegan to play a significantrole in the managementand input of geneticresources.

The Balanta and thePAIGCThe urban-based PAIGC(African Party for theIndependence of Guineaand Cape Verde) started itsactions in the southernborder area with GuineaConakry in 1962. ThePAIGC started its mobiliza-tion through traders andother local entrepreneurs,who spoke of the locallingua franca, Crioulo and,like the indigenes, werealso deeply dissatisfied withPortuguese rule. Among thefirst Balanta to join thestruggle were ambitiousyoung men, who had

already started a careeroutside the village context,attending mission schoolsand being employed in theshops of ponteiros.Consequently, the firstwave of Balanta mobiliza-tion caused a physical andsocial dislocation of youngmen. Eventually, Balantamobilization becamewidespread, and wascontrolled by the elders,who had by now becomeallies of the PAIGC.Despite this rapprochementbetween the PAIGC andBalanta village elders,military mobilizationintroduced a more outwardorientation of youngsters,and the loosening ofestablished labour relations,especially those crucial tosuccessful mangrove riceproduction. Although thesouthern regions of Guinea-Bissau were freed fromPortuguese rule at an earlystage, the situation thereremained dangerous, andagricultural productionconditions stayed uncertain.Some authors (e.g.Rudebeck 1974) state thatthe PAIGC was able toprofit from considerable riceharvests in Tombali, but theoverall picture indicates thatlarge areas of the tidal

flood plains known asbolanhas were damaged orleft unused.

Impact of the war onagricultureThe 12-year long independ-ence war affected man-grove rice farming in thefirst place because theBalanta rice farmingpeoples formed the majorityof the armed guerrillaagainst the Portuguesearmy. As a result of itsstrategic and economicimportance, the main rice-producing area, in thesouthwestern province ofGuinea, saw intensefighting and sufferedextensive damage. ManyBalanta were displacedduring the war. Some wentinto the bush to join theguerrillas, while others fledto safe havens or weremoved by the colonialauthorities into strategicvillages.

One of the majorconsequences of destruc-tion and dislocation was thedeterioration of the damsand dykes which were themain water-controlstructures in the ricepolders or bolanhas. Thiscaused salinization of thesoil which could only be


reversed after intensivelabour input during severalrainy reasons. Moreover,rice reserves decreased, orin some villages disap-peared entirely, leading to aconsiderable loss of geneticresources. In some areaslocal varieties almostdisappeared, while in otherareas there were severeshortages of plantingmaterials and farmers wereforced to plant anyavailable seed. As a resultof these conditions, rice

production decreasedsignificantly during the war.In spite of rehabilitationprojects concentrating ontechnical assistance (mainlyrepairing water controlstructures and distributingplanting materials, such asROK5), production declinedeven further after the war.The reasons behind thefailure of these rehabilita-tion efforts are dealt with inmore detail in Chapter 3.

The key point to noteis that the impact of war on

local seed systems andmanagement procedures ofplant genetic resources isboth direct through lootingand destruction of seedreserves and indirect, viachanges in social organiza-tion, as communitiesdisplaced by war attempt toregroup. In this particularcase, war weakened thesocial ties at the villagelevel which are essential formobilizing labour groups inmangrove rice farming inGuinea-Bissau.

Locked boxes used forseed and grain storage.

29

Rice varieties well-suited to prewar socialconditions, notably the salt-tolerant varieties adapted tothe main mangrove tidalareas, were no longerappropriate under thedrastically altered conditionsof post-war labour supply.War had ultimately deprivedelders of their power tocommand the largenumbers of young mennecessary to work theextensive mangrovewetlands.

Rehabilitation effortswere misdirected, byconcentrating on varietiessuch as ROK5, which wassuited to the relativelylarge-scale labour mobiliza-tion of the prewar situation.A more successfulprogramme would havesought to support other ricefarming econiches,including the associatedinland swamps more easilyworked by individuals andsmaller household groups.

ConclusionThree points can behighlighted from the casestudies.

War is a direct threatto crop plant geneticresources through lootingand displacement of the

farming population. Directdamage is especiallyserious when, as in thecase of Liberia, farming ishalted for seasons at atime. Several parts ofLiberia have now sufferedan almost completecollapse of rice agriculturefor five seasons insuccession. This clearlyhas major implications forthe management of plantgenetic resources, andsteps must be undertakento plan a major physicalrehabilitation exercisebased on crop plant geneticresources in use in cross-border regions. If actualgenetic material needs tobe reintroduced, it may notbe the same as the prewargermplasm. Seeds areneeded urgently for farmersto grow food, but thematerial may need tocontain sufficient diversityto allow post-war farmers toselect and adapt thematerial to the newconditions. The refugeesliving and farming in thesecross-border regions maybe a major human resourceto be engaged in planningand executing suchrehabilitation work.

Local seed systemsdepend for their continua-

tion on complex anddelicate social arrange-ments, which are easilythreatened by warfare. Thethreat is especially grave inlow-intensity conflicts, as inSierra Leone, whereinsurgent movements seekdeliberately to foment socialdisharmony to further theirown strategic ends. For thisreason the rehabilitation ofthe seed system cannot beconsidered a technicalmatter alone. One of theimplications of the casedescribed above is thatfarmers may require newincentives to cooperate inseed exchange to over-come fear and hostility. Atthe same time youngpeople recruited intoLiberian or Sierra Leoneanstyle militia forces must beassisted towards a morepositive assessment oflocal management of plantgenetic resources.

In the longer term, warmay accelerate or cause achange of direction inprocesses of social andagrarian change. In suchcases rehabilitation effortsmust be subject to carefulcritical review of thecontinuing relevance ofprewar seed technologies.The Guinea-Bissau study


offers a useful lesson inthis regard: rehabilitationagencies seized on thepost-war reconstructingopportunity to bring about afurther modernization of therice-farming practices of theBalanta by emphasizing the

introduction of a salt-tolerant, high-yield, modernvariety adapted to the mainmangrove rice ecology. Therehabilitation and develop-ment schemes failed torealize that war hadundermined established

social relations of produc-tion in this major rice-growing region of Guinea-Bissau. Thus the wrongapproach to modernizingthe seed system wasattempted, with predictablypoor practical results.

31

This chapter looks atinstances of seed assist-ance to farmers in war-damaged communities inthe West African rice zone.Again, different lessons canbe learnt from each of thecase studies. Humanitarian-assistance agencies inLiberia supplied displacedand refugee farmers withseed, but with littleattention to broader issuesin the management of plantgenetic resources. Seedsupply to war-affectedfarmers was effective inSierra Leone becauseagencies with detailedknowledge of local farmingconditions were involved.The key conclusion arisingfrom assessing the longer-term experience in GuineanBissau is that rehabilitationmust take account of war-induced socioeconomicchange.

Relief and seeds inLiberia: a cautionarynoteIn Liberia, food and seedassistance were undertakenby a number of relieforganizations based inMonrovia, Côte d’Ivoire,Guinea and Sierra Leone.The Catholic ReliefServices (CRS), Interna-

tional Committee on RedCross (ICRC), LutheranWorld Services (LWS),Methodist Relief Service(MRS) and Baptist ReliefService (BRS) all contrib-uted to the needs ofLiberian refugees frombases in either Monrovia orCôte d’Ivoire. The CRS,MRS and BRS distributedparboiled rice to refugees,while LWS providedrefugees with bothparboiled rice and seeds. Itis not clear where supplieswere obtained.

Some seed stocksappear to have beenacquired from multiplicationsources specializing inimproved types (oftenrequiring high input offertilizer and skilledmanagement for successfulcultivation). Other agenciesbought seeds from localmarkets in neighbouringWest African countries, butapparently without detailedconsideration of theirsuitability for the mainproduction conditions inLiberia, e.g. high levels ofiron toxicity commonlyfound in Liberian inlandvalley swamps.

UN agencies (e.g.UNICEF) were alsoinvolved in distributing US

seed-relief assistanceto war-damagedfarming communities3


parboiled rice to Liberianrefugees in Guinea andCôte d’Ivoire and todisplaced people inMonrovia. In 1992, somerice seeds were given byUNICEF to the Ministry ofAgriculture to be distributedto farmers aroundMonrovia. Farming toolsand seeds (but not locallyadapted types) weredistributed to displacedpeople and farmers in theGreater Monrovia region.One UN official told us thathe was not aware thatthere were significantdifferences in types of riceneeded for seed in Liberia.He would have takenaccount of this issue hadsuitable and timelytechnical briefing beenavailable. Unfortunately, as

at present, advisorydocumentation is unavail-able.

CARITAS Internationalis another relief organiza-tion catering to the needsof farmers from Danane (onthe Côte d’Ivoire border)and Monrovia. In early1991 when the farmers inDanane refused to allowLiberian farmers to farm ontheir land, CARITASnegotiated for farm land foruse by Liberian refugees.In addition to securing land,CARITAS also gave therefugees maize and riceseeds. A large quantity ofrice seeds was acquiredlocally, from markets inMan and Danane. This wasan opportunity to securelocally adapted cultivars.However, the seed

purchases were made byCatholic priests apparentlyunaware of the differenttypes needed. When itcame to distribution it wasfound that the seeds hadbecome mixed. The seedwas all sown in uplandfarms, with consequentpoor results. The improvedmaize seed, however, grewprofusely and yielded verywell.

The Ivorian government(sympathetic to the NPFLcause in the Liberian war)supplied about 40 000 bagsof seed rice for displacedand dislocated farmers inareas controlled by theNPFL militia. The seedswere brought to Dananeand stored in a warehousegiven by the city mayor ofDanane. Instead of freedistribution to displacedfarmers, as had beenoriginally intended, much ofthe seed was sold,allegedly by staff of theself-styled Ministry ofAgriculture of GreaterLiberia (the name adoptedby Taylor for territoriesunder NPFL control). Someof the consignment did,however, reach Taylor’sadministrative headquartersat Gbarnga for onwarddistribution to farmers in

Janeah Refugee Camp, Forecariah District, Guinea.

33

NPFL-held territories. It isunclear whether the seedsdonated by the Ivoriangovernment were similar tothe seed types used byLiberian farmers in theirprewar rice cultivationpractices.

In general, it wouldseem that there is littleawareness among reliefand rehabilitation agenciesworking in Liberia of theneed for locally adaptedrice seed. Few practicalsteps were taken toascertain which varietieswere needed where and inwhat quantities, or to planfor the multiplication ofthese varieties to assistpost-war reconstruction.Small-farm agriculture inLiberia was almost endedby seven years ofhostilities. Now thereseems some prospect ofpeace, the seed-rehabilita-tion issue needs to beaddressed in a comprehen-sive and co-ordinatedmanner.

Seed assistance towar victims in SierraLeonePrior to the war some ruraldevelopment projects hadbuilt up considerableexperience working with

farmer rice selections, andsome of these locallyadapted types had foundtheir way into the catalogueof the government’s SeedMultiplication Project.During a lull in hostilities in1992 some of thisexperience was drawnupon to plan seedassistance to war-displacedfarming populations. Thisexperience is worth somedetailed review since itprovides precedents forfurther schemes sensitiveto the issues involved inmanaging plant geneticresources.

Patterns of dislocationand displacementThe total number of farmfamilies dislocated byinsurgency in Sierra Leoneis not known with anyaccuracy. About 40 000farming households weredislocated in the first mainphase of RUF activity,1991-92, when the conflictwas confined mainly toabout one fifth of SierraLeone along the borderwith Liberia. Later activityby the RUF in the northand west of the countrycreated new refugees on alarger scale. The RUF wasnever a large movement

(with perhaps only 3000-5000 combatants) andattacks, though widespreadthroughout rural SierraLeone from 1994 onwards,remained essentiallysporadic. Away from theroads rice farmingcontinued in many areas,and intensified in somecases, making use oflabour input of young mendriven out of the diamondmining districts by fighting.Perhaps in all about33-50% of the 350 000prewar farming householdsin Sierra Leone weredisplaced by the conflict.

Like Liberia, SierraLeone has a flexible landtenure system. Strangersgenerally find it relativelyeasy to gain access to landfor annual cultivation.During the early stages ofthe Liberian war up to halfa million refugees weresettled and given land tocultivate in Sierra Leoneand Guinea without beingforced into camps. Accessto land is less of aconstraint for refugees andthe displaced than seedsand tools. Communitiesmay be generous with land,but the capacity of the localsystem to supply seedsand other farm inputs is

CHAPTER 3 SEED-RELIEF ASSISTANCE


finite, and soon exhausted.Not surprisingly, groupssuffering repeateddisplacements had themost difficulty with seedsand tools.

Insurgency and reliefin Pujehun, 1992Liberian irregulars (laterULIMO) and government

troops stemmed the initialRUF advance into SierraLeone in late 1991. Forcedback into a few pockets ofthickly forested land alongthe Liberian border, theRUF later switched itsefforts to the diamond-richKono District. Meanwhile itproved possible for anumber of agencies to

organize relief andrehabilitation programmesfor displaced farm house-holds seeking to return toPujehun and the southernparts of the Bo District forthe 1992 farming season.Useful lessons were learntfrom this experience. TheRUF invasion in its initialphase had little directadverse impact on theformal-sector seedorganizations in SierraLeone. In normal times theSierra Leone SeedMultiplication Project (SMP)produces annually enoughseed for about one fifth ofall farm households in thecountry. This was approxi-mately the number of farmhouseholds displaced byfighting in 1991. Timelyorders by Catholic ReliefServices, Save the Childrenand the Bo-Pujehun Projectsecured significant amountsof certified seed from SMP.SMP varieties are in mostcases official releases fromthe Rokupr Rice ResearchStation, the main riceresearch facility in SierraLeone. Several of thesevarieties are mainlyintended for high-inputwetland environments, butothers are selections fromlocal landraces suited to

Farmer (SambaDumbuya) with threshedrice harvested from hisswamp.

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upland and low-resourcefarming conditions. Thelatter types exactly fit thesituation of the greatmajority of farmersreturning to war-devastatedareas. Relief agenciessought advice on thesuitability of seed-stockacquisitions from nationalinstitutions of plant geneticresources, and as a resulttargeted appropriatevarieties, even if choicewas limited.

One agency, Bo-Pujehun Project, had agreat deal of in-houseknowledge of local ricevarieties, based on carefullong-term research intolocal farming systems. Theco-ordinator of the reliefprogramme for war-affectedchiefdoms in PujehunDistrict, anticipatingshortages of SMP seed,explored the possibility ofsecuring supplies oflandraces through localmerchants in areas outsidethe war zone. Specific usewas made of baseline datafrom the Mogbuama casestudy (Richards 1986) andorders for 600 bushels oflocal landrace materialwere placed with a localrice merchant in this rice-surplus region north-west of

Bo, at that stage unaffectedby the RUF. The merchantwas able to expand hisbuying operation signifi-cantly during the 1991Christmas sales rush, whenlocal farmers release seedto earn cash to coverholiday expenses, becausehe had been advancedcapital by the project inanticipation of its 1992rehabilitation needs. Thissuccessful case points tothe fact that agencies withgood local knowledge aresometimes able to makeeffective use of opportuni-ties within the informalseed system to meetsupply needs, provided notall districts are dislocatedby conflict. However, itshould be emphasized thatthe apparent success ofthis small Bo-Pujehuninitiative depended largelyon fortunate timing. Armedconflict in tropical forestzone conditions tends topeak during the dry seasonand become relativelyquiescent in the rains.Local seed purchases inSierra Leone and Liberiapeak in the Christmasperiod (i.e. early dry-season) whereas conflicttends to resume a monthor two later as rivers begin

to drop. An agency withgood local knowledge canmake use of thesewindows of opportunity incases of low-intensityconflicts. But once conflictbecomes more widespreadand intense, opportunitiesto secure local landracematerials rapidly disappear.

Rehabilitation that issensitive to themanagement of plantgenetic resourcesThe Bo-Pujehun Projectwas a rural developmentproject established at thebeginning of the 1980s witha mandate covering small-farm agricultural develop-ment in central-southernSierra Leone, funded as aco-operation between theGerman aid programmeand the Government ofSierra Leone. With abouthalf its operational areaaffected by insurgency inmid-1991, the projectopened a small relief andrehabilitation programmelate that year. Earlierfarming-systems analysisby the project hadconfirmed the value of locallandraces of rice, and thatthese remained competitivewith improved releases inthe view of farmers. The



project was thus highlyoriented towards manage-ment of plant geneticresources, having hadearlier experience runninga landrace-improvementprogramme called ‘thepanicle selection scheme’for dryland rice farmers.This background aware-ness of the long-termsignificance of managementissues in small-scale farmdevelopment helps explainwhy the Bo-Pujehun reliefprogramme in 1992focused on distributinglimited amounts of well-chosen planting materials(e.g. 2000 bushels of seedrice) backed up by high-quality supervision, ratherthan taking the bulk-oriented path to seed reliefpursued by some otheragencies. Measuringsuccess in terms of amountof seed distributed, ratherthan in terms of its qualityand effectiveness inapplication, other agenciessometimes expressedsurprise at the limitedcharacter of the Bo-Pujehun programme.Unfortunately the resur-gence of fighting in muchof Pujehun District in 1994made it impossible morefully to evaluate the

comparative success of thetwo approaches. Even so, itis highly relevant todescribe some of theapparently successfulfeatures of the Bo-Pujehunprogramme.

Throughout thePujehun District, farmerswere driven out of theirvillages during the earlypart of the 1991 farmingseason. Any crops alreadyplanted were lost, andstocks of planting materialsdestroyed, looted orabandoned to pests.Farmers’ and traders’stocks of cash-cropproduce (oil palm, kernels,coffee, cacao, kola) werealso looted or destroyed. Insome cases, farmers alsolost coffee plantations closeto villages, cleared on armyorders to create free-firezones and reduce the risksof ambush. The mosturgent need of displacedvillagers returning home inlate 1991 was for reliefsupplies of food, clothingand basic household itemsto tide them over to theharvest season August-December 1992, in additionto agricultural inputs for theforthcoming farmingseason. Some tree cropswere harvested during the

1991-2 dry season, andhouseholds with access tosuch crops were able toset aside a small amountof capital to buy farminputs, primarily seed rice.The price of seed rice roseto Le 8000/bushel in thewar zone, twice its cost inother parts of Sierra Leone.Many farmers trekked toneighbouring chiefdoms,sometimes 50 km or more,to buy seed rice, or borrowfrom sympathetic relatives.Some households ex-changed palm oil for rice atthe rate of one tin of oil forone can (0.5 bushel) ofrice.

Two further difficultieshampered agriculturalrecovery in 1992. The firstwas unseasonably earlyrainfall, a major factor thatperiodically limits output onupland rice farms in theproject area. Rainfallhampers burning offvegetation, with the resultthat extra labour is neededto clear the farm, the soil isless fertile and weed seedssurvive to cause problemslater. Early rainfall, oneyear in seven on average,is often the trigger for anexceptionally severe hungryseason in the followingyear (Richards 1986).

1 bushel = 36.4 litres

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The second difficultywas the sharp deteriorationin agricultural labour supply.This labour bottleneck wasparticularly severe due toextra labour demandsimposed by the effects ofearly rainfall. Prewar, labourshortage was the leadinglimiting factor in small-scaleagricultural production inthe war zone, especially inareas most affected bydiamond-mining activities.The RUF conscripted bothmale and female youngpeople, as potentialconverts to their cause, orsimply to serve aslabourers for militia groupsin the bush, cooking,fetching water and carryingsupplies. Some of theseyoung people then perishedin the fighting, or weresummarily executed assuspect rebels by govern-ment troops. Otherswithdrew with the RUFtowards the Liberian borderregion. Only a few weresuccessful in escaping andreturning to their villageswithout harassment. Jimi-Bagbo, a chiefdomheadquarters in Bo Districtoverrun in June-July 1991,had a prewar population ofabout 1000. Over 80 youngpeople were captured by

the RUF in the 1991 attackand two-thirds of thisnumber remained unac-counted for in September1992. Some households,with two or three youngpeople carrying out farmwork when the rebels firstarrived, were attempting tomanage farms without anyyouth labour inputs at all in1992. Typically, young menaged 15-24 should

comprise 7-9% of the totalpopulation in villages in theproject area in normaltimes. The 1992 ratio forJimi was less than halfthat. Reduced labouravailability is perhaps thesingle most important factoraffecting relief andrehabilitation activities inLiberia and Sierra Leone.

Some doubts wereexpressed about the


A farmer guarding acommunal farm made bydisplaced people in theSierra Leone eastern warzone in Segbwema in1992

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emphasis on quality ratherthan bulk of seed distribu-tion by agencies morefamiliar with food aidlogistics and evaluationcriteria. In the Bo-Pujehunrehabilitation, however, itseems the right choice wasmade. The relief pro-gramme distributed seed tofarmers’ groups registeredwith theproject duringthe prewarperiod. Thesegroups hadsome successin raisingcounterpartfunds forcommunitydevelopmentactivities,includingvariousproject-sponsoredconstruction programmes,by growing and selling riceand other commodities.Farmers’ groups becamevillage seed-multiplicationprojects, using starterinputs from the reliefprogramme to generateseed stocks for 1993 insitu. Seed inputs deliveredto these groups by theproject included carefullychosen local landrace

materials.Other relief programmeswere limited to seedselections available fromthe Seed MultiplicationProject. This restricted themlargely to the distribution ofa limited range of research-station releases, such asROK3, 16, 17, CP4, etc.The first three of these are

in fact research selectionsfrom local landraces, whilethe fourth is a long-established and popularcross between twointroductions from south-eastern Asia suited towetlands with low water-control. All four varietieswere appropriate to farmersneeds. But throughout thewar zone farmers werekeen also to secure niche-

adapted hardy localcultivars, neglected prior tothe war, but known to beespecially well adapted tofarm conditions underconditions of continuinguncertainty. Unable forsecurity reasons to venturefar beyond the village,many farmers were forcedto clear short-fallow land of

very low fertility, whereweeds and birds alsoproved a problem. Lackinglabour, many householdswere unable to carry outfamiliar labour-intensivetasks, such as themaintenance of improvedwetland farms.

In this situation farmersneeded specialized cultivarswith ability to survive onvery poor soils, tolerate

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less weeding and pestcontrol, or grow withinspecialized local ecologies,such as riverine wetlandsor iron-toxic swamps.Where these types wereavailable they helpedsupplement activities on themain farm, spreadinglabour peaks and increas-ing the duration of theharvest period. Among therequired specializedvarieties were floating ricesused in farming the riverinegrasslands along the lowerWaanje and Malen rivers.Short-duration hardy typeswere required for speciallowland (bului) farms,where cultivation prior tothe main farming seasonproduces a small harvestfor family consumptionduring the mid-rainy seasonhunger period.

It was possible to meeta significant number ofthese special requests forlocal hardy and niche-adapted types through theMogbuama purchasingarrangement. The matchingof available germplasm togroups’ needs andpreferences was far fromcomplete, however. Withgood prior organization andthe right professionalcapacity, relief organizations

could do more, not only tominimize the germplasmlosses occasioned by war,but also to maximize theavailability of thesespecially adapted typeswhose value only becomesfully apparent in emergencysituations.

Rehabilitation andinnovationWar changes the socialconditions under whichsmall-scale farmers producecrops. With careful thought,relief and rehabilitation workthat takes into account themanagement of plantgenetic resources cansometimes be set up toencourage useful innovationby farmers seeking toadapt in the post-warrecovery phase. Changedlabour-supply conditions isone of the most importantfactors to be considered.Experience in the PujehunDistrict in 1992 suggeststhat farmers may be quiteprepared to experiment withnew seed types and toreorganize farm productionin quite radical ways,provided it leads to betterutilization of availablehousehold labour. There isoften a mismatch betweenthe kinds of circumstances

war-blighted farmers findthemselves addressing andthe sorts of innovationsoffered by conventionalrural development sources.Many of these programmesassume intensified inputs oflabour to improve theutilization of over-populatedland. War imposes adifferent set of demands.

Farmers may have tocope with less than idealfarm sites while absorbingthe physical losses oflabour (or the breakdown ofestablished labour-sharingarrangements, especiallywhere these are dependenton significant levels ofsocial harmony and trust).This is why post-warrecovery may seem at firstto be a step backward, asmost farmers’ first attemptsaim to recover theresources and to revive thetechniques that allowedprewar agriculture withlimited labour. They alsorecognize a need toinnovate to cope withartificially acceleratedconditions of land-systembreakdown.

In the flux of post-warrecovery, many farmers arealert to the need to surpassthe simple revival of oldtechnologies. Studies of



farmers’ utilization of riceseeds in Sierra Leone,based on a national samplein 1987, showed a 20%uptake of research stationreleases, but also a smallbut significant uptake ofneo-traditional riceinnovations that could nothave come from theresearch sector (Lipton etal. 1989). These neo-traditional rices, reported byfarmers as recent innova-tions, are typically classedby Sierra Leone riceresearchers as types

intermediate betweenAfrican and Asian rice inmorphology, and may haveoriginated from farmerselection of spontaneouscrosses (Jusu 1996).

One of these neo-traditional intermediatetypes, acquired as part ofthe Mogbuama seedpurchase, aroused specialinterest among groups ofwar-affected farmers inPujehun District in 1992.The rice in question is ashort-duration (110-day)type originally collected inKamba, MagbemaChiefdom (in the KambiaDistrict of northwest SierraLeone), where it was notedby farmers as one of themost highly valuedinnovations of recent years.It has no established localname, other than tiri montrais (3-month rice). Stronglyaromatic with small verydense reddish grains, it isconsidered by farmers inKamba and neighbouringdistricts of northwest SierraLeone an especiallynutritious hungry-seasontype; eaten in the morningits effects are said to lastthe entire day. A smallamount (1.0 kg) wasintroduced to farmers inMogbuama (in central

Sierra Leone) in 1988, forlocal evaluation, as part ofa study on prospects forgreater use of short-duration varieties toameliorate the effects of thehungry season (Richards1991). Tiri mont rais hasbeen assigned provisionallyby Malcolm Jusu to O.glaberrima on account of itssimple-branched uprightpanicles, pear-shapedgrains, and short ligulescharacteristic of thatspecies. It is awaitingfurther investigation as apossible intermediate type.The grains are exception-ally small, and the seedcoat dark in colour.

Mogbuama farmershave used the variety withgreat enthusiasm and it isnow widespread in thevillages of the northernKamajei chiefdom underthe name sifoe-wangali.One particular advantageas a hungry season rice isthat it seems relativelyunattractive to birds, dueperhaps to the grain sizeas well as the colour andthe toughness of the seedcoat. A small amount wasobtained by the Bo-Pujehunrelief programme in late1991 (with difficulty, sinceMogbuama farmers are still

Displaced farmers wereenthusiastic about earlyAfrican rice. Pujehan,

Sierra Leone, 1992

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in the process of multiply-ing this variety for their ownuse) and distributed toPujehun farmer groups ona trial basis in 1992. Agroup at Koranko-Kpakaplanted 2.5 butter cups on26 May and harvested 14threepence pans (an input-output ratio of 1:25) on 13September.

The speed and yieldwere major talking points,and members of the groupplanned to reserve all seedfor multiplication purposesin 1993. A stand of thesame rice at Lagoh, BarriChiefdom, planted on 20June, was in flower on 17September. The farmergroup owning this samplewas highly interested in itsperformance because of itsshort duration, and becauseit had survived unscathedby birds during a shortresurgence of fightingshortly after planting. Thisgroup also planned toreserve as much aspossible for seed purposesin 1993.

Enthusiasm foradaptive experimentation by

groups of farmers undergo-ing post-war recovery is notrestricted to seed innova-tions alone. In some cases,particularly in the Barrichiefdom, farmers havelearned the value ofgrowing rice in the dryseason. Reports indicatethat in Potoru, before therebel invasion, only onefarmer did this on a regularbasis despite an unusuallylarge area of developedswamps in the chiefdom.However, several of therehabilitation groupsintended to continue thepractice on their owninitiative in subsequentseasons having experi-enced the benefits of dry-season rice cultivation.

Management of plantgenetic resources bydisplaced womenfarmers in PujehunIt is important to clarifywhich members of theseed-multiplication groupsare most skilled inmanaging plant geneticresources. We have notedthat despite some generalsimilarities in rice produc-tion systems across SierraLeone and Liberia, thereare often importantdifferences in the relative

roles played by men andwomen, and that thesedifferences sometimes havea major bearing on theallocation of responsibilityfor seed accession.

The Bo-Pujehun reliefprogramme sheds light onthis issue. In a meeting toevaluate the impact of theseed-distribution pro-gramme in 1992, group atLagoh-Barri confirmed thatin this part of southeasternMende, women areprincipally in charge of therice harvest. This is similarin much of the border zoneand Liberia more generally,but unlike Mogbuama, andcentral and northwest ofSierra Leone. Women inthis part of Sierra Leoneare aware of the need tomanage plant geneticresources, and claimed tounderstand and practisepanicle selection independ-ently of project initiatives.Men only assist with riceharvesting and seedmanagement, and are moreconcerned during the mainrice harvest period withother aspects of bush work,including the harvesting ofpalm oil bunches.

Women make the maindecisions about which riceto cook and which to keep


Local measurementsof volume


as seed rice, how to storebatches set aside asseed,and where to hidethese batches when theythink (as in the aftermath offighting) the seed will beunder severe pressure fromlarge numbers of indigentwould-be consumers withstrong social claims onhousehold resources. Ingeneral, Mende womenfrequently emphasize theirskilled knowledge of how to‘keep’ things. Fromdiscussions, it was clearthat men and women hadinterestingly divergent ideasabout which of the varietieslost in the insurgencyshould be the focus ofrecovery efforts. Women inLagoh mentioned gbapoi asa priority, for example,whereas men were moreinterested in nduliwa andbundubai. Some of thesedifferences are explainedby the differential propertiesof local rices whenevaluated according to anumber of distinct usedimensions. Lipton et al.(1989) assessed thirteencriteria deemed to beimportant in assessing ricevariety performance byhousehold members inSierra Leone. Men tend tostress agronomic factors,

including yield, whereaswomen are especiallyinterested in processingcharacteristics, how mucheffort and fuel is needed tocook different varieties, andhow well different typeskeep both before and afterpreparation.

Seeds, merchants andrehabilitation activitiesThe evaluation of the Bo-Pujehun programme in1992 included a brief visitto Mogbuama to assesswhether there had beenany adverse reaction to theremoval of 500 bushels (18200 L) of landracematerials by the project. Tosecure supply, the projectoffered rates slightly abovethe local price in late 1991and farmers seemed tothink the good prices duringthe Christmas period werebeneficial. This is a time ofyear when, just after theharvest all villagers haveavailable rice, and a rise inpreChristmas sales tends todepress prices; accordingly,this influx of purchases inthe local market helped themajority of villagers.

There was a generalair of satisfaction with theBo-Pujehun purchases,since the local rice trader

Young girl gleaning ricefrom an upland ricefarm.

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(and main agent for theproject) promptly reinvestedsome of his profits from anexceptionally busy tradingseason by buying stocks ofwhite rice in Bo. This hesold to Mogbuama peopleat Bo prices, plus transport,to encourage them tocontinue to supply landracematerials in 1993. Timelyavailability of white rice atreasonable prices duringthe rainy season helpedovercome the widespreadproduction bottlenecksfarmers faced as a result ofunseasonably early rainfall,and there was someconfidence locally thatpurchases of seed rice onbehalf of the project mighteasily be doubled.

Despite ambushes andattacks along the mainFreetown highway 7 km tothe south, Mogbuamafarmers report increases inareas of land cleared forrice production in early1995, suggesting that evenin conditions of moregeneral destabilization thereare still some parts of therural economy functioning.From this it would seemthat there is still somescope for repeating theearlier Bo-Pujehun initiativein purchasing landrace

materials for farmerrehabilitation in the mainwar zones.

In other areas,however, the capacity ofthe local informal system tomeet these seed-rehabilita-tion requirements ishampered by deliberatedamage inflicted by theinsurgents to local tradingcapacities. In the smallchiefdom headquarterstown of Sahn-Malen inPujehun District there were25 or more residentstranger-traders before theRUF invasion in 1991. In1992 only five or six wereleft. Pursuing a revolution-ary anti-trader rhetoric, theinsurgents targeted andexecuted a number oftraders to establish theirpopulist credentials withfarmers allegedly under theexploitative grip of thesevillage ‘usurers’. Themerchants who could fled,and have been reluctant toreturn. Mainly GuineanFulas and Mandingos,these small-scale mer-chants were essential tothe performance of thelocal cash-crop economy,advancing farmers moneyagainst purchases ofcoffee, palm produce,cacao and kola (among

other commodities).Farmers often use creditfrom traders to fund otherproductive activities (e.g.hiring labour, purchase ofseed rice, etc.).

The rebels tried torationalize to villagers thehostility to traders byclaiming that a Fulamerchant had opened fireon one group of insurgentsin the initial incursionacross the Liberian border.These stories are similar toones circulating in Liberiathat NPFL opposition to theMandingo stems from twoMandingo merchantshaving revealed an earlierplot to assassinatePresident Doe. It seemsmore likely that the anti-trader animus originatesfrom both a simple strategicconsideration (a desire togain the political support ofhighly indebted villagers),and from a more generalideological propensityamong the core ex-studentpolitical leadership withinthe RUF to see allmercantile activity asinherently corrupt andcorrupting.

In 1992 the cash-croptrade had reverted mainlyto itinerants, such as theFula kola traders who



venture down from Boduring the season. Evenamong this group manywere deterred by the fearof further rebel attack, anduncertainty about thesituation at militarycheckpoints. Local peoplerecognized that the returnof resident traders wouldbe better for the localeconomy, but few largetraders had the confidenceto begin business again inJimi or Sahn. Oneexception was a shop-keeper in Jimi, who havingborrowed money fromkinsmen in Bo to restockhis shop, was doingbusiness selling importeditems to diamond diggers.By contrast, the mainprewar produce trader inJimi remained in Bo in1992, and only one of theprewar Guinean tradersreturned to Sahn.

Agriculturalreconstruction:lessons fromGuinea-BissauThe post-war strategies ofnational and foreigndevelopment agencies inGuinea-Bissau were aimedat restoring mangrove-ricefarming. Apparently one ofthe underlying premises of

these strategies was thatthis rehabilitation could beachieved by concentratingupon technical assistance.These efforts includedrepairing water works withmodern materials, machin-ery or labour investments,mobilized through food forwork programmes. Theyalso included distributingrice varieties, notablyROK5, and other technicalinputs. Balanta communi-ties, it was assumed, wouldthen resume their prewaractivities, labour organiza-tion and productionsystems.

The engineers basedtheir strategy on astereotypically static imageof Balanta society, whichthey believed still prevailed,or could be resurrected inthe aftermath of war. Thisimage of society wasbased on certain presuppo-sitions about these peoples’culture: Balanta wereknown to be independentlyminded, tradition-oriented,cohesive, and everywherefocused on their majorcrop, rice. The assumptionof the technical assistanceagencies was that giventhe facilities for rice farmingoffered by aid programmes,the old Balanta society

suppressed by war wouldspring back into life.

Post-war socialorganization andmanagement of plantgenetic resources inGuinea-BissauA comparison of pre andpost-war social organizationin Guinea-Bissau revealstwo major changes integralto rice farming. First, thecrucial relationship inBalanta society betweenelders and young men hadbroken down during thewar. After the war, youngmen were no longer directlycontrolled by their elders,but sought sources ofincome outside theirvillages, and/or tended toproduce rice on their ownaccount. Secondly, eldersshifted the focus of theirpolitical action fromcontrolling their sons’ labourtowards the management ofeconomic activities at thevillage level more broadly,mainly through their controlover certain ritual proc-esses.

The most importantconsequence of thesetrends for rice farming wasthe fragmentation of unitsof management and labourmobilization (simply put,

45CHAPTER 3 SEED-RELIEF ASSISTANCE

there was a shift inorganizational focus fromthe village/compound leveltowards household units).In turn, the large lowerfields in the mangroveecosystems were no longerused as they had beenbefore the war. Asagrocommercial entrepre-neurs disappeared after thewar, Guinea-Bissau (nowindependent) followed amodel of state-controlledeconomic development. Inpractice, the state-controlledarmazens do povo werenot able to effectivelyreplace the ponteiros.Interestingly, theponteiros largely remainedoutside every analysis orstudy on mangrove ricefarming; they simply had noplace within the develop-ment strategies and socialplanning of the 1970s.

Surprisingly, a numberof the most influential ofthese colonial entrepre-neurs joined the MarxistPAIGC administration. Byneglecting the nature andimportance of these twosets of changes, rehabilita-tion strategies whichseemed sensible from atechnical point of view weredirected primarily in asocioeconomic context

which no longer existed.This explains in part thedisappointing results fromthe introduction of ROK5.Up to the late 1980s,production had hardlyimproved over war-timelevels. Over 50% of fieldsin the mangrove zone hadfallen into disuse. Labourmigration to the capital andneighbouring countriesintensified after independ-ence, and rice importscontinued to increase.

In the immediate post-war period there was aconsiderable shortage oflocally adapted mangroverice cultivars, many ofwhich had been lost duringthe conflict. ROK5 wasintroduced as the mainalternative. Technically, thisrelease was well-adapted tomangrove soil and waterconditions in Guinea-Bissau. The variety gavehigh yields and its colour,taste and cooking timewere also locally accept-able. But for ROK5 to be asuccess it was necessaryto move back into full-scalecultivation of the mainmangrove wetlands. Watercontrol structures wererehabilitated or improved,but this alone was notenough. The key factor in

the successful cultivation ofthe main mangrove areasis an abundant supply ofwell-organized labour.Before the war this wassupplied by ‘age grades’ ofyoung men often workingon the scale of an entirevillage or village sectionunder the co-ordinatingauthority of the villageelders. The war changedthis relationship, andundermined the authority ofthe elders. Outmigrationreduced the pool ofavailable labour; even whenyoung men were availablefor the work they nowpreferred to work independ-

Fence constructed tokeep pests out of aswamp rice plot.


ently, farming the associ-ated (rain-fed) wetlandsbetter suited to thispurpose and growing cropsother than rice on uplands.As water-control structuresin rice cultivation areviewed as a marker oftechnical progresselsewhere in the world, itseemed clear to the newlyindependent Marxistgovernment and aidagencies that rehabilitationof the mangrove farms wasa priority.

Another importantfactor involved in the inputof genetic material was theponteiros. Since theiractivities were aimed atEuropean markets they hada clear-cut preference forwhite-skinned, fast-cookingvarieties of rice. Thispreference influencedfarmers’ decisions, sincerice was cultivated as acash crop as well as forsubsistence. However, localcultivars of Asian Rice andall varieties of African Riceare red-skinned, leadingmerchants and ricecultivators in the mangroverice zone in Guinea-Bissauto select against thesevarieties for economicreasons. Since red skincolour is a dominant

Children playing on theback door step, underokra seed which hasbeen kept by theirgrandmother (SernorFatmata Kamara).

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characteristic, farmer-managed supplies of white-skinned varieties tended tobecome more mixed overtime. In the prewar situationthis gave the ponteiros astrong vested interest inmaintaining stocks of locallyadapted seeds with thedesired qualities to ensurethat the rice they boughtfrom farmers had thedesired characteristics.Ponteiros thus became anintegral link in the localseed supply chain, andtheir disappearance afterthe war may have been asdisruptive of local manage-ment of plant geneticresources as the war itself.

The idea of isolated,autonomous Balantacommunities hid the prewarrole of the vital commercialnetworks through whichmangrove rice producingvillages and families werelinked. For ideologicalreasons, politicians,scientists and developmentexperts largely neglectedthese commercial networks.They were more concernedwith the progressivesocialist development ofpost-war Guinea-Bissau. Itis worth noting that thesecommercial networks,integral to the rise of

mangrove rice cultivation inBalanta country, were notdead but only dormant; asa consequence of recenteconomic liberalization theyhave experienced arenaissance.

Summarizing thelessons of Guinea-BissauThe case of Guinea-Bissauclearly shows the extent towhich prewar and post-warsituations may differ. Thishas direct relevance for theway agencies interested infarmer rehabilitation in theaftermath of war view theirtask.

The main genetic inputin the rehabilitation of ricefarming after the LiberationWar (1962-1974) consistedof ROK5 seed material.Although this has positivecharacteristics and wastechnically adjusted to theenvironment, it is a seedchoice that implicitlyassumed that the prewarsocio-economic organizationof the farmers (with arelatively large scale labourmobilization demand) wouldbe readily revived. In realityland management andlabour organization in ricefarming was rapidlyfragmented after the war,

ultimately affecting thehousehold unit of produc-tion. This had immediateconsequences for the levelof land and labourmanagement, as lower,more productive and morelabour-intensive fields wereno longer used to the sameextent as before the war.

In addition, the post-war disappearance of theagrocommercial entrepre-neurs, a vital set of actorsin the prewar rice farmingcomplex, had seriousconsequences for the riceeconomy. This void effectednot only commercialization,but also the local manage-ment of rice geneticresources when animportant stimulus to seedselection was removed.Relief and rehabilitationprogrammes initiated aid,as water managementinfrastructure was restoredor improved and newplanting materials wereintroduced, under theassumption that farmerswould make use of thesefacilities automatically. Dueto the radical changeswhich the war had createdin the fabric of ruralagrarian society, theseefforts proved largelyunfruitful.


ConclusionsSuccessful seed assistanceto war-affected farmers thatis sensitive to managementissues in plant geneticresources is feasible in thekinds of conditions currentlyexperienced in countries ofthe West African rice zone,but two requirements standout. There is need for goodlocal knowledge of adaptedseed types, and forcooperation from farmers inareas outside the war zone.As experience in Liberiahas revealed, not all aidagencies have the requisitelocal knowledge. Where anentire country has beenrepeatedly destabilized oversuccessive agriculturalseasons (as in Liberia),cross-border assistance inrecovering locally adaptedplanting material seems tobe called for (a pointdeveloped in Chapter 4below). Moreover, war is asocial as well as a military

process. Post-war relief andrehabilitation is often muchmore than an attempt torecover the original statusquo; seed assistance mayhave to embed itself withincomplex processes of war-induced and post-war socialchange. Diverse sections ofsociety (men and women,young and old) may findthemselves engaged andaffected by militaryprocesses in very differentways.

The post-war situationdemands new and diversecrop genetic resources: It isa common experience inmany wars that returningfighters do not easily findtheir place within war-distorted social formations.Inter-generational tensionmay result, and have amarked impact in a varietyof ways, such as patternsof labour mobilization inagrarian societies. TheGuinea-Bissau material

indicates that crop plantgenetic resources are notjust adapted to specificeconiches, but can also bespecific to certain forms oflabour organization. Inaddition, post-war condi-tions may dictate largechanges in crop-typepreferences as a result ofalterations in the socialrelations of farmingproduction. These changesneed to be monitored andtheir significance forselecting and maintainingcrop genetic resources fullyand carefully evaluated.Specifically, every post-warrehabilitation initiative needsto understand exactly howconflict has altered thedistribution of power andauthority among thegenerations and betweenthe genders as well asidentify the implications ofthese changes for agricul-tural production systems.

49the management of plant geneticresources and post-war recovery4 This chapter addresses twoquestions. First, to whatextent has war affected theinstitutions and proceduresfor managing plant geneticresources in the threecase-study countries?Second, what role mightmanagement of plantgenetic resources play inpost-war recovery?Answering the secondquestion we point to a newand potentially valuablecooperative linkagebetween managementinstitutions and humanitar-ian assistance.

The existingframework

International, nationaland local frameworksFormal responsibility formanaging plant geneticresources is vested, in allthree case-study countries,in national agriculturalresearch systems (NARS).Rice researchers in allthree countries collect andcharacterize localgermplasm to improve rice.They also collaborate withinternational centres in theCGIAR system. IITA (inIbadan, Nigeria) had a riceresearch programme forAfrica, and IITA plant

explorers collected about500 local varieties in SierraLeone in the mid-1970s. Aduplicate collection waslodged with the nationalrice research station atRokupr, but was lost in1980, when cold storageequipment was looted fromthe station during action bythe security forces to quella riot of daily paid workers.IITA has more recentlyrelinquished responsibilityfor rice in West Africa to areconstituted WARDA,based in Bouake, Côted’Ivoire. At a global level,formal management ofplant genetic resources inthe three case-studycountries is supported bythe major rice genebankcollections maintained byIRRI in the Philippines, andby the policy work andtechnical support of IPGRI.

Rice researchers in thethree countries collaborate,both bilaterally and throughthe CGIAR-systemnetworks, in exchanginglocal germplasm andimproved releases. ALiberian landrace selection,LAC23, was rereleased inSierra Leone as ROK17,and has been adoptedextensively by drylandfarmers in that country.


Similarly, the Rokupr salt-tolerant release ROK5 waspromoted extensively inGuinea-Bissau in the post-war recovery phase.

How well does thecurrent systemfunction in war?The destruction of ex siturice germplasm collectionsat Rokupr in 1980 servesas a warning that suchcollections are vulnerable tolooting by ill-paid govern-ment security forces as wellas irregulars. Rokupr wasbriefly threatened by RUFactivity in January 1995and again in February1996, and staff wereevacuated to Freetown.Some scientific staffreturned to the station aftera few weeks, and relativelylittle damage was sus-tained. By their nature,physically sprawlingfacilities in relativelyinaccessible countrydistricts, research stationsare hard to secure againstthe proliferation of armedgroups and bandit gangs ofthe kind that lingered in theaftermath of a period ofmore formal conflict, as ineastern Nigeria after theCivil War 1968-70.

In Liberia, rice research

facilities were extensivelydamaged by fighting andare no longer functional.There were two main riceresearch stations in prewarLiberia: the nationalagricultural researchsystems (NARS) and theWest African Rice Develop-ment Association (WARDA).CARI was located atSuacoco, Bong County, andWARDA at Fender, nearMonrovia. CARI wasinvolved in collecting,conserving, breeding,multiplying, documentingand releasing rice varietiesto Liberian farmers. Two ofthe more successful of thevarieties are Suacoco 8, aniron-tolerant variety well-adapted to swampcultivation in Liberia, andLAC 23, an upland cultivar.Both are pureline releasesfrom locally adapted farmerselections. The instituteinvested substantial effortsto purify and test Suacoco8 and LAC 23.Both CARI and WARDAsuffered major reverseswhen the present civilconflict engulfed Liberia.Conserved plant geneticresources and researchfacilities were looted anddestroyed, and severalmembers of staff taken by

surprise by fighters werekilled. Of those whoescaped some weredisplaced within Liberia,and others crossed theborders into Côte d’Ivoire,Guinea and Sierra Leone.CARI ceased to operate asa rice research facility, butwas turned into a majorguerrilla training camp andresidential area for theNPFL faction in the civilwar. For a long time on theactual front line betweenopposing forces, WARDAfacilities at Fenderrepeatedly changed handsbetween faction fighters.WARDA was entirelyreorganized in the interimand no longer has a directpresence in Liberia.

Rethinking the roleof genebanks

In situ versus ex situconservation, or a newapproach?There is an importantdebate in managementcircles about the relativemerits of in situ and ex situconservation of landracematerials. Those whoadvocate strengthening insitu conservation point outthat farmer selectivepressure is a neglected

51CHAPTER 4 MANAGEMENT AND POST-WAR RECOVERY

aspect of the managementof landrace materials. Thetwo central arguments aresometimes conflated. Thefirst is a biologicalargument, the claim that itmay be better to encouragefarmers to continue tomanage a landracegenepool in evolutionaryreal time, rather than toabstract and ‘freeze’ thismaterial in ex situ collec-tions. The second argumentis socio-political in natureand concerns the relativemerits, strengths andweaknesses of formal andinformal institutionalarrangements for plantgenetic resource manage-ment. Informal arrange-ments (such as farmerseed exchanges) may bebetter adapted than formalarrangements (like legalprocedures governingacquisition and circulationof genebank accessions) toserve the adaptive needs oflow-resource farm house-holds in the typicalcircumstances faced inmany regions wherelandrace materials remainimportant (bad communica-tions, weak government,neglect of the interests ofthe poorest sections insociety). Unfortunately the

institutional argument doesnot apply in war-torncommunities. The informalsystem, as we have seen,is severely inadequate.Local seed exchange is amajor casualty of LIC.Much of the farm popula-tion is itself ex situ as aresult of the war, living incamps for refugees or asdisplaced strangers. At thesame time, the nationallevels of formal systemsare also highly vulnerableto war damage.

Thus, post-warrecovery seems to call forsomething entirely new interms of organizationalarrangements and practicalinitiatives. This new system(detailed below) should bea hybrid of some aspectsof existing formal andinformal practices togetherwith new elements arisingfrom practices morenormally associated withthe work of relief andrehabilitation agencies, andsupported by internationalgenebank facilities. There is(we have discovered) somewillingness on the part ofthe interests involved inmanaging plant geneticresources, war-affectedfarmer groups and the reliefand rehabilitation agencies,

to contemplate practicaloutcomes from thisunprecedented convergenceof interests. As yet thereexists no clear idea abouthow to build on thisconvergence; we seek toaddress this issue in theremaining sections of thechapter.

Relief agencies: foodaid and seed aidAccording to preliminaryinformal enquiries ad-dressed to a number ofBritish and Dutch basedorganizations, relief andrehabilitation agencies arepotentially interested in theidea that post-war recoveryinitiatives in Africa mighthave explicit componentsinvolved in managing plantgenetic resources. There isnow the need to discussscenarios as well aspractical and action-ready,proposals.

These comments focuson a number of conceptualreorientations that might benecessary if the worlds ofrelief and genetic resourcemanagement are to findcommon ground. The firstof these conceptualreorientations has alreadybeen noted in the discus-sion on efforts to develop


A farmer outside the warzone multiplying a localvariety for sale to reliefagencies, central-northern Sierra Leone,1982

farmer rehabilitationprogrammes in war-affectedregions of Sierra Leone in1992. Relief and rehabilita-tion agencies are moreoriented to bulk distributionof food aid than to thesupply of high quality‘packages’ of geneticinformation.

Seed supply to farmersseems on occasion to bemanaged as an extensionof food aid. It is seen asan exercise in getting a

standard bulk commodity inplace as speedily aspossible. Food aid orientedagencies often do noteasily understand what isdifferent about seed aid,and the new standards andcriteria against which theeffectiveness of such aidmust be judged. Themanager of a reliefprogramme in one of ourcase studies, havingprocured large supplies ofseed rice on the worldmarket, was frank enoughto tell us that no attentionwas paid to varietalsuitability. He had simplynever been briefed aboutthe issue, and wassurprised to find that not allseed rice was equallysuitable to conditions in thecountry concerned.However, he was willing tochange things in future iftimely expertise could bemade available. It is thiskind of invitation to whichthe management commu-nity should seek torespond.

Relief-developmenttransitionsConversations with reliefand rehabilitation agencystaff during the preparationof this report brought to

light a second potentiallyimportant opportunity formanaging plant geneticresources. Many agenciesare acutely aware of thepotential danger of food aiddependency developingamong groups of refugeesand people displaced byconflict. One way tocounteract such tendenciesmay be to seek ways tolink relief and rehabilitationactivities with longer-termrural development initia-tives.Currently there is animportant debate takingplace within the agenciesabout why these twospheres of activity havebeen so separate in thepast, with somewhatdistinctive institutionalcultures, and how to bringabout better linkage andcooperation in future.Efforts to manage plantgenetic resources might bea perfect focal point uponwhich some of theseinitiatives might converge,since the kind of manage-ment schemes for plantgenetic resources outlinedhave drawn from the firstphase of relief activities,namely getting inputs todisplaced rural people toallow them to survive the

paul

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immediate aftermath of war.There is also potential todevelop this into longer-term rural developmentinitiatives by stimulatingfarmers’ interest ininnovation processes asthey adapt to unprec-edented post-war circum-stances.

Opening the genebankto new clientsIt becomes clear that reliefand rehabilitation agenciesare not yet very wellinformed about thetechnical and organizationalresources upon which theymight draw in developingany such initiatives. Herewe conceptualize the issueas one of makinggenebanks accessible toNGO’s. By this we meannot only the “back-stopping”institutions of final refer-ence, but also all thenetworks of professionalexpertise in managing plantgenetic resources and theprocesses, including farmerexpertise and informal seedexchange, associated within situ management oflandrace materials.

It is important to decidewho will act as therepresentatives of thefarming communities in

contacting genebanks andother management facilitiesif they have information andgenetic resources ofpotential value for farmerrehabilitation in theaftermath of war. Wesuggest that NGOs andother agencies working forthe relief and rehabilitationof farmers are best suitedfor this task. However, reliefagencies do not have anaccurate understanding ofthe services thatgenebanks and otherelements in the networkmanaging plant geneticresources might supply.Furthermore, genebanksand other managementfacilities currently do notyet count NGOs and otherrelief-oriented groupsamong their clientele andare instead too narrowlyfocused on the needs ofbreeders. In light of thesepoints, we need to identifywhat can be done tofacilitate new workingrelationships. We offer thefollowing short list of pointsconcerning technicalchanges and awareness-raising activities as acontribution to an urgentlyneeded discussion of thisissue.

Attempts need to be

made to pinpoint what kindof assistance might bemost crucial for farmerseed rehabilitation initia-tives. War interrupts thenormal circulation oflandrace materials butrenders such materialslocally extinct only in themost dramatic instances.Even in Cambodia, manylandraces survived a totaldisruption of local ricefarming, thoughreintroductions from theIRRI genebank seems tohave been effective inspeeding up the recoveryprocess. Probably thegreater need is for reliefand rehabilitation agenciesto be able easily andquickly to tap the adviceand information availablewithin genebank facilities,not the genes themselves.

The focus then shifts tothe structuring of genebankinformation systems toprovide answers that reliefagencies are likely to need.Many genebank collectionsare under-characterized,and when such work isundertaken many questionsare raised about the actualvalidity of landracecollections (as suggestedby a recent review of thebarley collections in the


Dutch genebank by vanHintum 1994). Even moreimportantly, accessionpassport data typicallytends to under-representthe kind of social-economic,cultural, and agronomicdata likely to be of mostuse to relief agencies.Farmers’ groups and theirNGO agents are concernedwith issues such as whichlandrace in a region shouldbe collected and multipliedin anticipation of a sharppost-war deterioration inlabour supply; whatequivalents exist fortemporarily unavailablelandraces most suited towomen’s special needs;and what are the besthardy, short-duration typesfor a given area. Tounderstand whether or nota genebank facility is able

to accommodate the needsof new client groups (war-damaged farming communi-ties/relief agencies), testingof the facilities in questionagainst specific sets ofcircumstances will berequired.

Building awareness ofthe expanded role ofgenebanks and in situgenetic resourcesWe suggest approachingthese concerns in thefollowing way. A number ofworkshops should beorganized to bring together,in the first instance,specialists in managingplant genetic resources andfield staff of relief agenciesfamiliar with the post-warrehabilitation of farmingcommunities (in time itmight be possible to

incorporate representativesof these communitiesdirectly into the process).The task of these work-shops should be to buildspecific conflict andcatastrophe scenarios.From these scenarios a listof questions would begenerated to determinehow the information andcollecting systems ofgenebank facilities can bestaccommodate farmer needswhen rehabilitating war-damaged communities. Thistype of activity would serveto develop a mutualunderstanding of the issuesraised by professionalsfrom both the managementand relief fields, and leadtowards the reorganizationof collections and informa-tion-support systems inways that would improvegenebank disasterpreparedness.

In more general terms,it is vital to identify thepractical role of thegenebank: whether nationaland international collectionsshould seek to developsome of the diverseactivities of the world’smajor museums andlibraries, or if research isthe only remit (Eyzaguirreand Iwanaga 1996).

Farmersvisiting the

Rice ResearchStation atRokupr onOpen Day.


Political support forconservation dependsultimately on publicawareness; the specificcapability to supportrehabilitation of war-damaged rural communitiesmight be a very effectiveway to raise publicunderstanding of the issuesinvolved in managing plantgenetic resources, and tobuild broader popularsupport for conservinggenetic resources.

Role of plant geneticresources programmesin post-war recoveryThere are two underlyingpoints in our attempt toidentify the conditionsrequired to make genebankcollections more accessibleto agencies undertakingpost-war rehabilitation offarming. Drawing a sharpdistinction between ex situand in situ genetic resourceconservation is not veryhelpful for war-affectedcountries. Farmers can anddo hide, and sometimeslater recover, importantgenetic resources, butthese methods will neverbe completely effectiveagainst repeated waves ofdislocation and violence.Displaced farming commu-

nities are themselves exsitu, and even the best-established nationalfacilities will never beinvulnerable to looting, thedestruction of buildings, andthe loss of key specialiststaff during a war. If post-war rehabilitation activitiesare to restore farmers’prewar levels of geneticdiversity, they will rely to anextent on regional andinternational ex situfacilities. The issue thenbecomes how to makethese facilities more visible,accessible, and useable bya new and unfamiliarclientele (NGO relief andrehabilitation agencies andwar-affected farmers).Certainly genebanks arelimited in their holdingcapacity, and thereforecould not be an effectivedirect source of all theplanting materials neededfor rehabilitation work. Insome cases, they may bethe last resort if rarematerial with potential valuein post-war recovery hasbeen entirely lost. In theseinstances a rehabilitationprogramme might turn to agenebank for initialmaterials, and incorporatelong-term strategies forencouraging farmers and

community seed projects tomultiply landraces whichare in high local demand.War is unlikely, however, tocause the local extinction oflandrace materials; seedssurvive in many unpredict-able places, and landraces(by definition) are geneti-cally diverse.

The more importantrole for genebanks is as asource of information aboutlocally adapted plantingmaterials and possiblelandrace substitutes (fromneighbouring regions).Currently most genebankcollections may not beoptimally (or even well)organized for supplying thistype of information. Arecent assessment of thebarley collections in aDutch genebank highlightsthe problem of irregularcollections, and much basiccharacterization work stillremains to be done oneven the best-managedcollections (van Hintum1994). Even whenavailable, this informationtends to be orientedtowards the needs ofbreeders and not reliefagencies. In light of theseproblems, we propose threeinitiatives to improvegenebank support for the


post-war recovery constitu-ency:

1) New collectingprotocols for genebankaccessions need to bedeveloped which includethe kind of socioeconomicpassport data of greatestpotential significance torelief agencies. Some ideaabout what data could beincorporated can be gainedfrom a management-specialist review of the on-the-ground experience ofrelief and rehabilitationagencies trying to reactivateinformal systems damagedby conflict. Recent effortsby IPGRI to revise thecollecting forms to includesocioeconomic andethnobotanical informationare one step in thisdirection (Eyzaguirre 1995).

2) The currenteffectiveness of existinggenebanks and collectionnetworks should be tested,using a number of potential(or actual) war and disasterscenarios, to meet theinformation needs of reliefand rehabilitation agencies.This might be done throughorganizing country-focusedNGO-genebank workshopsin which the participantsdeveloped their war/post-war-recovery scenarios to

evaluate the genebankfacility in question. Suchworkshops might providean effective way to developbetter reciprocal under-standing among agencystaff of management issuesof plant genetic resourcesin war-torn societies.

3) Working relation-ships need to be estab-lished between genebanksand on-site relief agents,for example throughcreating fellowships andbench facilities for refugeespecialists in the manage-ment of plant geneticresources actively associ-ated with the work of reliefagencies. Such a refugee-visitor programme mighthave as one of its centralaims the characterization ofcollections from thestandpoint of rehabilitationneeds, linked to ongoingrelief and developmenttransition projects incountries undergoing post-war recovery.

Post-warmanagement ofplant geneticresources: practicalinitiativeWe conclude this reportwith a discussion of somepractical possibilities for

seed assistance that issensitive to the manage-ment of plant geneticresources by farmers inwar-torn communities. Apotential programme isoutlined for rice-farmingcommunities disrupted bywar in Liberia and SierraLeone. This proposal hasbeen developed by a SierraLeonean specialist in ricegenetic resources (MalcolmSellu Jusu) and a Liberianagronomist (MulbahGonowolo) with experienceof working with refugeecommunities on the Liberia/Côte d’Ivoire border, afterreflection upon the generalissues raised by this study.

The regional seedsafety web: a new kindof genebank?Both in situ and ex situmanagement facilities haveproven highly vulnerableunder conditions of WestAfrican rural insurgency.The old conception of agenebank as a free-standing, static, ‘hardware’facility should be replaced,we suggest, by a new‘software’ conception: asociotechnical ensemble,linking seed reserves, seedsystems, informationnetworks, technical


facilities, relief agenciesand farmer groups in atransnational web ofmutually reinforcinginteractions (a seed-safetyactor-network). We proposecalling this the regionalseed safety web (RSSW).In an ideal model theRSSW should be in placebefore conflict arises. Thepresent challenge is toconstruct such webs inconditions of ongoingconflict and post-warrecovery. We propose tostart the process of web-building in a ‘bottom-up’manner, trying wheneverpossible to adapt the firststeps in this new seedsecurity initiative to thework patterns of reliefagencies in the field.

First steps: thesecurity collectingmissionThe initial activities will beundertaken through theagency of a new type ofemergency-oriented, seed-security management teamwe term the securitycollecting mission (SCM -small teams of manage-ment specialists of plantgenetic resources accompa-nying emergency reliefworkers in the field).

Minimally, an SCM wouldcomprise a geneticresources specialist/breeder,a social scientist familiarwith local crops andfarming environments, anNGO liaison officer, andrepresentatives of refugee/displaced farmer groups.The SCM team would betrained, cleared and readyto follow emergencyfeeding programmes. Suchfeeding programmesgenerally require promptregistration of refugees anddisplaced people, and aSCM might use thisregistration exercise as anentry point to assess long-term needs for locallyadapted varieties andpotential germplasm losses.Displaced or refugeefarmers may have lostcontrol of their bulk seedsupplies, but grain geneticresources are in fact oftenquite durable. With suitableearly warning, manyapparently lost seed typeswill be readily recoverableprovided an assiduoussearch is instituted andresearchers have a clearidea of their targets.

1) The first major taskof a SCM will be to recordwhat planting materialsrefugees or displaced

farming populationsdepended on in their homeareas and in what propor-tions. This establishes abaseline from which toassess how seed needsmight have changed in thecurrent environment. It alsobuilds a framework forplanning the process ofsecuring and multiplyingstocks of adapted materialsfor an eventual return home.The SCM will then need to

Outputs from the security collecting mission

The aim of the SCM is to secure the followingoutputs within a 3-year time scale:● basic information from refugee and

displaced groups about seed losses● security collecting of threatened material● preliminary assessment and

characterization of key germplasmresources advice to relief agencies aboutseed acquisition and distribution policy

● advice to refugees/displaced farmer groupsabout locally adapted planting material fortheir new situations

● seed multiplication activities involvingrefugee/displaced farmer groups to securesupplies of appropriate planting material forreturning farmers

● participatory analysis with refugee/displaced farmer groups of social changesinduced by war affecting farmer-managedand local seed system activities

● social research with farmers’ groups torebuild or replace existing seed systems

● monitoring and evaluating the impact ongenetic resource distribution, food securityand livelihood security

● monitoring and evaluating war and post-warrecovery programmes.


decide, on the basis ofthese data, whether thevarieties in question arealready known to science,whether starter supplies formultiplication can beacquired from existingregional genetic resourcecollections, and whetherthis is a purely local varietyrequiring collecting andcharacterization. Referencewill be made to informationnetworks maintained forthis purpose by a series ofparticipating regionalinstitutions (see below).

2) The SCM shouldthen organize meetingswith refugee/displacedfarmer groups at an earlystage of the recoveryprocess to elicit refugees’own ideas about a possiblestrategy for recoveringimportant material. Even inpeace time farmers oftenacquire starter seedthrough unusual routes(viable seeds scattered inthe bush by birds, orattached to clothes, loadsand packing materials).Alternatively, seed searchactivity may be somethingto be linked to food forwork programmes andundertaken by children orolder or weaker refugeesunable to do more

physically demanding farmwork.

3) A third step at thisstage is for the SCM socialscientist to map local seedsystems. Ultimately thisprocess seeks to under-stand whether conflict hasentirely disrupted the seedsystems and if so whatprospects might exist forrehabilitation, while alsoseeking to begin to analyzewar as a social processand open discussion withdisplaced groups about keysocial aspects of seed-security issues. Two keyexamples of this from theGuinea-Bissau case studywould be the commerciali-zation of the seed systemand the relationshipbetween labour mobilizationand seed choice.

4) Working in closeconsultation with relevantrelief agencies and refugee/displaced farmer repre-sentative groups, the SCMwill then assume theresponsibility to plan andimplement a seed collect-ing, multiplication andredistribution strategy fordisplaced, returning andresettled farmers. The SCMwill expect to assistdisplaced farmers to adaptto new environments by

acquiring and organizingthe multiplication ofappropriate locally adaptedplanting material. Wherematerial has to be importedfor refugee or returningfarmers the SCM willexpect to advise reliefagencies on their seed-acquisition policies.

5) The SCM willstimulate and co-ordinaterefugee/displaced farminggroups to multiply scarcebut important varieties asreimbursement for reliefassistance. This componentof SCM activity seeks toaddress the problem ofdependency among refugeepopulations. The intention isto ameliorate the logisticalbottleneck of findingsuitable sources of plantingmaterials when the focusshifts from relief torehabilitation. Multiplicationactivity is intended to helpfocus the explicit attentionof displaced farmer groupson the social aspects ofseed system issues (suchas the disruption to existingarrangements, and on thepossible need for socialinnovation by refugee/displaced farmer groupsthemselves to overcomethese disruptions).

Where women are key


agents in the seed-recoveryprocess the social scientiston the SCM must under-stand gender issues, or agender specialist must beadded to the team. It isexpected, given theparticular significance ofwomen rice farmers inmanaging local aspects ofthe informal seed system inLiberia and eastern SierraLeone, that much of thisactivity will be focused onwomen’s groups. ThePujehun rehabilitationexperience in 1992 will alsoassist, where womenexpressed enthusiasm forthe idea of a system ofinter-village, cooperative,seed-exchange activitiesunder their direct control. Itis proposed to establishtwo SCM teams, with staffmainly recruited fromamong refugee anddisplaced scientists in theregion, to work on a trialbasis in cooperation withNGOs engaged in reliefand rehabilitation activitiesarising from the civil war inLiberia and insurgency inSierra Leone. The Liberia-oriented team will probablywork in a cross-bordercontext (based either inGuinea or Côte d’Ivoire).The Sierra Leone team

would be attached to oneor other of the NGOscurrently operating in andaround the Sierra Leonewar zone. Both CARE andAction Aid are agenciesthat might be interested inhosting such an initiative.CARE has in-house staffwho, through experiencesetting up and running afarmer-participatory cropgermplasm developmentprogramme (the SAVEinitiative), would be highlysuited to the workproposed.

Higher levels in theregional seed securitywebThe intention behind thepriority focus on SCM isnot only to meet an urgentpractical set of needs, butalso to create a context inwhich higher level changesin genebanking activitiesare induced by the need tosupport SCM-type activities.Including SCM in the workof relief and rehabilitationagencies will strengthen thecase for continued supportand also induce theorganizational reform of themanagement of plantgenetic resources in war-affected regions. Thecontinuing success of SCM

will be ensured by efforts tocreate and sustain baselinedata, back-up informationsystems containing suitablesocio-economic as well asbiological data, andcollections of well-characterized and ad-equately sampled plantgenetic resource acces-sions (with duplicatesdistributed across theregion for security pur-poses). This implies carefulattention to the dynamics ofregional cooperation in themanagement of plantgenetic resources in apolitical climate clouded bythe regional tensions whichcause or exacerbatedconflict in the first place. Ina particular sense, geneconservation authorities willhave to become concernedwith international relations.

Seemingly, the WestAfrican rice zone has someof the necessary institu-tional frameworks alreadyin place. WARDA, one ofthe newest and smallestinternational researchcentres in the CGIARsystem, has been able tomaintain coordination ofrice research issues despitethe existence of national,and Anglophone-Francophone political


rivalries affecting thecourse of the presentconflicts in Liberia andSierra Leone. In severalrespects it is atypical,having existed previouslyas a regional cooperativeventure supported (onpaper at least) mainly bythe governments of Africanrice-growing countries. Onlyrecently has it joined theCGIAR system as aventure with strong Africanroots; an African director,and a majority of Africanscientific staff, might proveto be a timely solution tothe kinds of diplomaticallydelicate situations thatinevitably arise in attempt-ing to build an effectivesystem of regionalcooperation in themanagement of plantgenetic resources acrossa number of planes ofpolitical cleavage.

Earlier it was stressedthat rehabilitating seedsystems cannot beregarded as a technicalactivity taking place in apolitical vacuum. Addition-ally, WARDA is nowcommitted to a policy ofcomplementary support andcapacity building in nationalresearch organizations. Inthe past its research

programmes to someextent rivalled or overrodeexisting national pro-grammes. This emphasison complementarity andsupport should prove aneffective basis for forgingcooperative managementactivities designed tosupport recovery in war-damaged environments.Therefore we envisage aregional seed security webfor rice in West Africawhich might involve allnational research centreswith a rice speciality,coordinated by WARDA,with technical support andcapacity building inputsfrom IPGRI. Each institutionwould make contributions tothe information system,take part in data collectingexercises, maintaincollections (includingstrategic duplicates), andundertake seed gatheringand characterization workrelated to seed security andpost-war rehabilitation.

Where possible,individual contributionswould serve in a dualcapacity. They wouldcontribute to the overallseed security web whilealso fitting specific needs,such as national pro-grammes for low input and

sustainable agriculturetargeted at low-inputfarmers. Additionally, theparticipating institutionswould be encouraged todevelop effective workinglinks with the NGO sectorand relief/rehabilitationprogrammes on a researchcontract and consultancybasis (for example,seconding personnel toSCM teams) via theseNGO links with farmergroups (including refugeeand displaced farmergroups). The participatingnational institutions wouldalso be encouraged to takepart in baseline andmonitoring exercises in themanagement of plantgenetic resources, eitherfrom the more generalstandpoint of exercises toprepare for disasters, or inresponse to specific post-war rehabilitation needs.

ConclusionAt a general level, themanagement system forplant genetic resourcesbeing proposed abovewould represent a shift ininstitutional culture. Thesystem moves away fromthe idea that agriculturalresearch is primarily aquestion of accelerated


growth of output. It tendstowards the notion thatmaintaining, restoring orcreating sustainablelivelihoods is a focus ofperhaps equal or greaterimportance. In the contextof conventional agriculturalresearch, genebanking isviewed as a service. Thekind of distributed seedsecurity web advocatedhere, by contrast, is nolonger a service to a tinygroup of agriculturalprofessionals, but a way ofconceptualizing andactivating a vision ofsustainable agriculture inpoor countries facingturmoil and insecurity. Sucha web would serve adouble purpose - it wouldbe a way of conservingplant genetic resourcematerial, but also a way ofprotecting regions againstfood insecurities associatedwith the disaster of war.Daunted by prospects ofmounting costs of security

operations, the internationalcommunity now talksincreasingly about ‘conflictprevention’. One of thelessons of the regionexamined in this study isthat warfare becomesincreasingly the only optionfor armies of youngsterscast loose by war-inducedcollapse of rural econo-mies. Opportunities to exitthis vicious circle arise atunpredictable moments. Itwould be tragic if suchoptions were foreclosed bythe loss of biotechnicalviability of local agriculturalsystems. Thus it needs tobe understood clearly thata properly thought-out andtried-and-tested system forthe management of plantgenetic resources in war-prone regions is anessential concomitant ofconflict prevention.

The challenge, goingbeyond existing humanitar-ian assistance, is toestablish and support plant

genetic resources manage-ment institutions, formaland informal, that:● contribute to better

rural livelihoods● create rural alternatives

to militia warfare● function to protect

biotechnical viability ofagricultural systemseven during episodesof conflict

● support post-conflictreconstructioninitiatives.

This is an agenda for theplant sciences on the scaleof the post-1945 GreenRevolution, though startingfrom different premises.Far-reaching debate aboutappropriate strategy,technique and institutionaldevelopment is nowneeded to arrive ateffective practical propos-als. This document isoffered as a stimulus tosuch debate.


R

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PB SEEDS AND SURVIVAL: CROP GENETIC RESOURCES IN WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION IN AFRICAabbreviations and acronymsABRS Baptist Relief ServiceCRS Catholic Relief ServicesCGIAR Consultative Group on International Agricultural ResearchIITA International Instituite for Tropical Agriculture, CGIAR, NigeriaIPGRI International Plant Genetic Resources Institute, CGIAR, ItalyIRRI International Rice Research Institute, CGIAR, PhillipinesLIC Low intensity conflictLWS Lutheran World ServicesNARS National agricultural research systemsPAIGC African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape VerdeROK5 A rice variety introduced from the national rice research programme in Sierra

Leone. It was intended for the salty reaches of the lower Scarcies estuary andmore widely promoted by the WARDA Mangrove Rice Research group atRokupr for areas requiring salt-tolerance

RSSW Regional seed safety webRUF Revolutionary United FrontSCM Security collecting missionSMP Sierra Leone Seed Multiplication ProjectTAO/UCL Working Group on Technology and Agrarian Development, Agricultural Univer-

sity, WageningenUNICEF United Nations Childrens FundWARDA West African Rice Development Association

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