Burkina Faso/Crop year 2025-2026: Good production prospects in Bankui and Sourou
Since July, the 2025-2026 wet agro-pastoral season has been well underway in the Bankui region, formerly known as the Boucle du Mouhoun. On some farms around Dédougou, farmers are busy with various tasks. While some are still at the sowing stage, others are weeding and ridging. The dominant stage for the various cereal crops is bolting. On Thursday, July 24, 2025, we visited farms in some of the city's rural outskirts to see for ourselves how the season is progressing.
Two million four hundred and ninety-seven thousand (2,497,000) tonnes of agricultural produce, all crops combined. These are the production targets set by the ex-Boucle du Mouhoun region for the 2025-2026 wet agro-pastoral season. It's a challenge set by producers and the government's decentralized technical services in charge of agriculture in this part of the country. From the west to the east, including the northern part of the town of Dédougou, producers are hard at work. On Thursday, July 24, 2025, we went to meet some of the farmers on their farms.
It's exactly 8:30am, and we're off on our mounts. We headed for Kamandena, some fifteen kilometers west of the town of Dédougou. After passing through the village of Souri and riding for a good thirty minutes or so, we arrive at Tanko Doyé's field. A resident of Souri, he farms a field on the outskirts of Kamandena. Our visit coincides with the day when he welcomes a group of young people from the village who have joined forces to take turns helping each other in the fields. The atmosphere is good-natured. The youngsters compete with each other in the use of the daba. This season, he has planted nine hectares of maize, millet, sorghum and cowpeas. The plants are at different stages of development. Some are just emerging, while others are in the bolting and tillering stages. Mr. Doyé reports that sowing of legumes and sesame is continuing in his field. He believes that the campaign will go well. However, he deplores both the abundance and scarcity of rainfall, which is not conducive to the normal and desired growth of seedlings.
Good field appearance, growers' hopes
All along the route, most of the fields along the RN 10 were in good condition. The focus then shifted to the eastern outskirts of the commune of Dédougou. The disparate evolution of the different speculations is the same. Sian Paré, a retired military officer, farms an area of around three hectares. On his plot, he has produced rice, peanuts, corn and watermelon. In the midst of weeding his clearly visible peanut field, Chief Warrant Officer Major Sian Paré, a former commando and parachute jump instructor with the now-defunct RPC, confided that he had started sowing very early on. "As soon as the first rains came towards the end of May, I planted rice", he declared. Wearing a broad smile, he hinted that if "the current rainfall dynamic is maintained until the beginning of October, producers will be rubbing their hands".
His neighbor Omer Banazaro is an Internally Displaced Person (IDP). He has been given half a hectare of arable land. On this plot of land, he has sown maize and sorghum, which are in the bolting stage. Satisfied with the sequence of rains, the farmer hopes to do well at the end of the crop year. He pointed out that his first seedlings were planted on June 11 and, by a stroke of luck, they all germinated at the earliest opportunity. On the other hand, Boussouma Drabo said he had to sow at least twice before getting the desired growth. He owns six hectares of corn, millet and sorghum fields in the area. According to him, the campaign got underway a little earlier this year, giving grounds for hope.
In the village of Soukuy, some thirty kilometers north of the town of Dédougou, the agricultural campaign is still going strong. This is the case in Sounsoura Coulibaly's field, where cowpeas are in the pre-flowering stage, sorghum in the bolting stage and millet in the tillering stage. A plot of maize planted with the KPJ variety is at the heading stage. Another plot of SR 21 maize is in the bolting stage. For the current season, Mr. Coulibaly has planted 15 hectares compared with the usual 18. He explained that this situation is linked to the security situation. Like him, insecurity has prevented a number of local growers, such as Samuel Coulibaly and Jonas Dakio, from cultivating land considered more fertile.
A visit to Elysée Sama's field in the Badala locality rounded off our tour of the day's farms. President of the Regional Union of Agricultural Entrepreneurs, Elysée has planted 32 hectares to corn, sorghum, millet, sesame and cowpeas. He started the campaign on June 24, 2025, and his plants are already looking good. He explained that his cooperative had benefited from the ploughing of tractors and power tillers made available to farmers by government authorities.
Producers unable to benefit from government support measures
While Mr. Sama's cooperative has benefited from the ploughing of mechanical means offered by the authorities, this is not the case for the other producers we met in the course of our research. Tanko Doyé claims to have heard of these tractors. Except that he didn't know where to go to benefit from their services. Boussouma Drabo, on the other hand, says he has taken steps to find out, but to no avail. The inaccessibility of state-subsidized fertilizer is a bottleneck for growers like Sian Paré. "All my attempts to acquire subsidized fertilizer have come to nothing. Each time, I was told that there was a code problem or that there was no fertilizer," he laments. Moreover, he believes that only members of associations or cooperatives are eligible to benefit from state support measures for the agricultural world. "I had to go through friends who are members of cooperatives to get five bags of fertilizer at 12,000 CFA francs each," he revealed. Sian Paré hopes that, in the future, producers will be able to benefit, individually or collectively, from the favors of the State, which, according to him, is making enormous efforts to support farmers.
The State alongside the players to win the bet
Fayçal Téguéra, Regional Director of Agriculture, Animal Resources and Fisheries for Bankui (ex-Boucle du Mouhoun), clarified these concerns. According to him, subsidized fertilizer is essentially intended for vulnerable producers. As a result, the region has received 10,000 tonnes of subsidized fertilizer for the current season. These inputs have been distributed to target producers. The director points out that large-scale producers are able to acquire these inputs directly on the market, but find themselves asking for this state support. "This is largely to blame for the inaccessibility of agricultural inputs cited by some farmers", he pointed out. According to him, the needs in this area are colossal, but the State, he declares, is pulling out all the stops to support all producers. This is evidenced by the subsidy of an additional 80 tonnes of fertilizer exclusively for local internally displaced producers (IDPs). As part of the measures to support these IDPs at regional level, Mr. Téguéra notes the acquisition by local authorities of 200 hectares of arable land from landowners for their benefit.
With regard to mechanical resources, namely tractors and power tillers, donated by the country's highest authorities, the new Bankui and Sourou regions currently have 41 tractors and 90 power tillers, all in operation. However, the director admits that it is almost impossible to satisfy all the players at the same time, given "the high demand". He also pointed out that only identified IDPs can benefit from free ploughing. All other beneficiaries must pay 10,000 FCFA per hectare ploughed by tractor, and 5,000 FCFA per hectare by power tiller, according to Director Téguéra.
All in all, the 2025-2026 wet season is well underway in most of the former Boucle du Mouhoun region, according to the regional director. It is showing a good physiognomy, with good crop development crowned by a more or less calm phytosanitary situation. Fayçal Téguéra concludes that, with good rainfall combined with the commitment of players in the field, the region will fully play its role as the granary of Burkina Faso.
Source: lefaso.net/
