Solidarité - Organisation de Solidarité Internationale - IVORY COAST, THE REPUBLIC OF BENIN & BURKINA-FASO The BRO Tropical crops

The development of tropical crops

Project region : Ivory Coast, the Republic of Benin and Burkina Faso.

Objective : To promote bread making with local crops: millet, maize, manioc, sweet potato, yam etc and to develop a wide variety of derivative food products, going under the generic name BRO. To develop local productions and employment in that particular field, therefore coming in aid of farmers and women of the "informal industry". To contribute to reducing the dependency to crop importation (especially wheat) and thereby cut back financial expenditure.

Action taken :

The creation and implantation of BRO manufactures
Research, training and marketing
Awareness campaigns
Developing rural areas
Promotional campaigns

A step towards alimentary self-sufficiency and economic independence, in Sub-Saharan Africa.

For the past 15 years SOLIDARITÉ has been working in collaboration with ENSAT (Ecole Superieure Agronomique de Toulouse). A new variety of bread using 75% flour from tropical crops (including millet and maize) has been manufactured, as a result of the research conducted by ENSAT between 1988 and 1994 and the contribution of Professor Jacques Berthlot

The final objective of the project, is to establish BRO across Africa and to propagate its impact on the food industry, healthcare, employment, the income of the most impoverished, land settlement and the economic balance of each and every Sub-Saharan nation.

However, initially it is necessary to develop and experiment with the product and its impact in a more confined region.
For historical reasons, Ivory Coast was chosen for the first stage of the experiment, which was conducted from 1995 to 1997 (the idea of making bread from tropical crop stemmed from here)

The idea was to create a wide range of BRO food from the generic product, which would then be promoted and developed in an experimental research facility, consisting of a training centre and a production unit. Finally, small BRO production units would be set up around the country employing underprivileged women from the ‘informal sector’

Thanks to the, ‘It’s smarter, it’s Ivorian, it’s BRO’ campaign, which was backed by both the Ivorian government and the European Commission delegate, the BROCI project (CI: Cote d’Ivoire) benefitted from widespread support from the media: Television (BROCI featured twice on the evening news and in one documentary) Radio (4 local broadcasts and 3 on Radio France International) and over ten articles in various newspapers.

One the whole, the BROCI project is reproducible throughout Sub-Saharan Africa, as all these regions use wheat based bread in their diet and produce cereal and non-cereal based flour for essentials other than bread making.

The project has now been implemented in Burkina Faso and Benin.