| This declaration was made at the end of the farmers’ meeting on the occasion of the 9th edition of National Farmers Day held from the 16 - 17 December 2004 in Gaoua. Burkina Faso producers are convinced that from now on agriculture should be seen as a trade that provides a living and prosperity to its practitioners. Moreover, this vision motivates our commitment to professionalising it in view of promoting productive, sustainable and competitive agriculture. Agriculture and the campaign against poverty continue to be our concern, in the sense that more than 90% of the poor live in rural areas. It relates to the category of rural dwellers whose survival and means of existence depend directly on agriculture, cattle rearing, forestry, fish farming and so on. We are also convinced that this question also concerns political decision-makers. Therefore, the State is as much in debt as the producers, but we notice that the agricultural sector has not entirely responded to our expectations as a means to combat poverty. Lived experience in Burkina Faso and other countries such as the "white revolution" in India in the 70s strengthen our conviction that agriculture can be an effective means to combat poverty. However, we need to ask ourselves some questions: · How can we encourage milk producers to bring in high-yield breeds and feeding formulas designed to increase the national milk production if our markets are constantly flooded with imported (and subsidised – Ed.) milk or produced from food supplements? · How can we promote the modernisation of agricultural concerns without a policy promoting the processing and consumption of local products? These few questions demonstrate that you, the political authorities and we, the producers have good reason to meet for debate and discussion. Accordingly we have focused on some points to challenge and discuss with the Government: 1: Policies of support for Burkinabé agriculture Confronted with the context of disengagement, liberalisation/privatisation and globalisation, poor rural producers are facing up to enormous difficulties in relation to access to markets on the national as well as on the international level. We understand the difficulty of using the rare resources of the country to subsidise our agriculture, as is done in the North at present. However, our history teaches us that those who today advocate opening their markets have first protected their agriculture before opening their borders. Certain important countries still continue to protect their agriculture implicitly by imposing the famous ‘quality controls’. Therefore our proposals for discussion on the policies of support for agriculture are the following: · Introduce a taxation policy specific to certain imported farming products, and whose revenue would serve to set up a support fund to develop the farming industries involved. Concerning the choice of industries, it could begin with rice and milk. · Introduce mechanisms for the regulation of food product imports so as to allow a better circulation of local products at certain times of the year. This could be done by means of taxation, or imposing an import quota or any other suitable mechanism. · Greater government involvement in development promotion for the processing of farming products in Burkina Faso, by creating the right climate in incentives. At this level, Burkina Faso producers commit themselves to take the necessary action in partnership with the processors and consumers in order to promote the consumption of locally processed products. 2: The competitiveness of Burkinabé farming products Aware that our agriculture remains less productive and that there are limits of poverty to overcome, Faso producers have taken a commitment to work for a strengthening of the policy of professionalising. We are convinced that the struggle for a more appropriate agricultural policy alone is not enough. Our aim by means of professionalising is to improve productivity and the quality/cost ratio of our farming produce. Therefore, our proposal to the Government in terms of support measures in view of professionalising is: Setting up a systems policy to alleviate taxation on agricultural inputs and materials. 3: The Food Aid Policy Burkinabé agriculture remains very vulnerable, as it is heavily dependent on climatic factors, such as rainfall. This explains the repeated food crises that producers frequently have to face. Without calling food aid as such into question, our challenge to the government is to develop a policy of food aid which will effectively help the Burkinabé to dispense with food aid. The success of the "white revolution" in India (with milk), demonstrates that we can use food aid effectively to develop farming industries, in other words: use food aid to eliminate aid. We are convinced that if we seek appropriate answers to all these questions together we will have improved the role of agriculture in the campaign against poverty in Burkina Faso. Faso Farmers’ Confederation | 
View from the South