Survey to help improve decision-making in agricultural sector |02 October 2017

The annual agricultural survey to get a complete inventory of all registered farmers and all agricultural land under production took place from September 15 – 30.

The survey covered all registered farmers on Mahé, Praslin and La Digue and data collected will be analysed and published next year.

The result obtained will help improve decision-making in the national agricultural sector.

It is also expected that data collected will build up and update the database for agriculture in Seychelles and will additionally provide information for the development, review, monitoring and evaluation of agricultural policies as well as provide agricultural data to all interested stakeholders.

The survey is funded by the Competitive Local Innovations for Small- Scale Agriculture project (Clissa) through the International Fund for Agricultural Development (Ifad) and the component to evaluate cost of production is financed by FAO. 

This is the first time ever that the Agricultural Production Survey includes a component on cost of production. This follows a government’s request for a technical assistance on Agricultural Cost of Production (AgCoP) data collection and compilation.

The cost of production component is aimed among other things to:

- Provide insight into agriculture sector contribution to the whole  economy;

- Improve the measurement of agriculture value-added;

- Identify best practices in farming, such as input use and support training and outreach programmes of extension workers;

- Allow a better understanding of farm practices and their differences across regions, countries and farms;

- Simulate the effects of different policy alternatives, the impact of technology and technology adoption, and returns to new capital investment;

- Better understand commodity supply and price situation to ensure sufficient farm revenues and food availability;

- Provide decision makers with reliable information to enable more precise price determination for inputs and outputs;

- Set food import and export levels and better inform trade policy.