Paper short abstract:

This paper will provide an in-depth look at the Liberian government's "Operation Production" between 1963-70, which was a clarion call for an increase in national rice production to bolster the country’s level of food self-sufficiency for greater economic self-reliance, as well as farmers’ respones.

Paper long abstract:

In 1963, in the midst of a major debt crisis, President William Tubman of Liberia launched "Operation Production", a clarion call for an increase in national rice production to bolster the country's level of food self-sufficiency for greater economic self-reliance. While most rural Liberians regularly engaged in subsistence rice farming, surplus production was limited. Therefore, those living in the urban capital of Monrovia were forced to rely on regular rice imports from abroad. Tubman did not only announce Operation Production in front of the legislature, but personally travelled to the rural areas to spread this message to the wider population; and successfully so as it caught the attention of many small-scale or grass roots farmers. Nevertheless, as Operation Production began to shape policy in a concrete manner, the precise path to food self-sufficiency remained relatively obscure for most Liberians, causing conflict between aspirational small farmers and the large-scale planters who were in need of cheap and even compulsory labor (aided by revised vagrancy laws, for instance). This paper will examine Operation Production in the context of Liberia's "unification" (or, rural integration) policy, which represented a broader developmental vision, whilst taking the wider global Cold War politics that generated such projects into account. It will illuminate some of the inherent contradictions that existed in the rally call, which summoned all Liberian farmers to action, yet, the governmental structures that were put into place only supported a successful few.