Despite having about 75% of their labour force in agriculture, West African countries cannot meet their domestic food requirement because of the following reasons:
(i) Climatic conditions vary from area of excessive rainfall to areas of excessive drought. These two types of climatic conditions are detrimental to crop and animal growth.
(ii) The farmers lack requisite technical knowledge and modern skills to raise the standard of farming and agricultural production in their countries.
(iii) West African farmers still use crude implements such as cutlass, hoes etc for farming. They have no opportunity for mechanized farming.
(iv) The sale of products is limited to their immediate environment because of poor transportation and communication systems.
(v) The imbalance in urban- rural economy has led to rural -urban drift. Agriculture has thus been losing its vital labour force without replacing it with mechanization.
(vi) Land tenure system encourages small scale farming. Modern agriculture is difficult under the existing land tenure system which makes the transfer of ownership of land extremely difficult.
(vii) Pest and diseases reduce the quality and quantity of agricultural products since farmers cannot afford to purchase insecticides.