Given its importance as an urban staple and growing importance in the consumption basket of rural people, rice has become a key part of Mali's food strategy. Despite considerable increases in production since the 1990s, Mali still relies on imports for about a quarter of its rice needs. Following the 2007/08 commodity price crisis, Malian authorities affirmed the political will for substituting rice imports by domestic production. To date, major increases in production have mainly come from public-led investments in large-scale gravity fed irrigation infrastructure in the Office du Niger (ON). However, given the high costs of maintaining and expanding this irrigation scheme, Mali is now considering strategies to boost domestic production outside the ON zone in more marginal lands such as inland valley swamps (bas-fonds). This study uses both standard budgeting techniques and domestic resource cost analysis to assess the competitiveness and the comparative advantage of bas-fonds and ON rice in selected domestic and West-African markets with the aim to provide empirical analysis for supporting further investment decisions in the rice subsector in Mali. The results show that Mali has a very pronounced comparative advantage in the production and marketing of rice on its national territory, with ON rice being more competitive than bas-fonds rice in most markets. Despite numerous constraints that hinder the comparative advantage of Malian rice in subregional markets (e.g., apparent overvaluation of the currency and high transport costs), the prospects for Malian rice exports seem encouraging, given the high likely payoffs for improving the productivity and post-harvest handling of rice.
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