Burkina Faso inaugurates flour mill

By John Reidy

A new flour mill with a daily capacity of 220 tonnes of flour and 80 tonnes of bran was inaugurated in Gampéla, Burkina Faso, as part of national efforts to boost domestic production and reduce reliance on wheat and flour imports.

The Moulin Double Star Mill (M2S) was constructed by the Zidnaba Group at a cost of 15 billion CFA francs ($23.6 million), according to the office of President Ibrahim Traoré, who attended the inauguration ceremony on Feb. 20.

Burkina Faso, a land-locked West African country of 23 million people, imported 270,300 tonnes of wheat and 16,700 tonnes of wheat flour to meet domestic demand in 2023, according to the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO).

Burkina Faso does not produce wheat, but the government announced in October the country had dedicated 5,000 hectares to the grain for the 2024-25 season to enhance food security and begin to reduce dependency on imports. 

The new mill is expected to be part of this development, said El Hadj Souleymane Zidnaba, chairman of the board of directors of the Zidnaba Group.“It is in the desire to respond to the government’s call for greater local processing of our raw materials, thus reducing our dependence on the outside, that our company has launched the construction of an industrial complex, specialized in the production and marketing of wheat flour and derived products,” Zidnaba said.

This article has been republished from The World Grain.