The Ministry of Finance commenced the FY 2026 Bilateral Budget discussions with Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) on Thursday, 18th September 2025, at its conference room at the Treasury Building in Freetown.
The FY 2026 Bilateral Budget discussions will enable stakeholders to discuss and agree on policies that will guide the theme and policy direction of the just concluded National Policy hearing on enhancing traditional and innovative sources of domestic revenue mobilization to finance the Big Five Game Changer.
Matthew Dingie, Financial Secretary, admonished MDAs to be innovative in their 2026 budget by exploring alternative sources of domestic revenue generation to finance the Big Five Agenda.
The bilateral discussions started with the Ministries of Agriculture under Feed Salone and the Ministry of Basic and Senior Secondary Education under Human Capital Development. The Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security presented a budget estimate of NLe115,548,100 for the fiscal year 2026.
Presenting the budget, the Chief Agriculturist Professor Abdulai Jalloh noted that the mandate of the ministry is to be the engine for socio-economic growth and development in achieving food security, employment opportunities, and poverty reduction.
He added that the Feed Salone Programme, anchored on six strategic pillars, aims to increase productivity, enhance value addition, and empower farmers to develop rice production hubs in areas such as Ketchum, Mambolo, the Tomabom rice project, etc.
The Chief Agriculturist Officer also noted that they planted 23,437.903 hectares of rice across the country, 4,500 hectares of irrigation infrastructure were developed, 200 rice mills, 142 rice threshers, and 144 combine harvesters were distributed nationwide.
He stated that so far, they have achieved 24,295 hatches of boliland and riverine cultivated across the 15 districts, 20 tractors produced by three private sector businesses, 174 youths trained as tractor operators, drone and GIS operators, and farm machine mechanics, and many more.
In another development, the Ministry of Basic and Senior Secondary Education requested NLe1,422,435.70 for the FY2026-2028 Medium-Term expenditure framework.
The Deputy Director of Education, John Ansumana, in his presentation, explained that the mandate of MBSSE is to plan, oversee, and implement educational policies and regulations in all educational institutions from pre-primary through senior secondary levels, and is also responsible for planning and implementing policies alongside statutory bodies like the West African Examination Council (WAEC).
He stated that in 2024 and 2025, the Ministry recruited 2,198 teachers using the new deployment protocol to address equity in the distribution of teachers across the country. Additional schools with Science Laboratories were equipped, the double shift system in schools was phased out, the number of beneficiaries increased, 42 schools were connected to the internet (GIGA Project), 2,000 Out-of-School Girls were integrated into formal schools in four districts, fifteen districts benefited from the school feeding programme, 59 Early Childhood Centres were constructed through GPE, Teacher Licensure exams were conducted for over 17,878 teachers in all 16 districts with a pass rate of 46%, and 201 schools were connected with solar mini-grid power, among other achievements.
Mr. Ansumana presented the plans for 2026 fiscal year that, the Ministry would provide teaching and learning materials to 10,827 public and communities school, expand the school feeding program to one million beneficiaries in government and government assisted schools, mini-grid power electrification and internet connectivity for digital literacies for 500 school and Provision of furniture for additional classrooms to eliminate the double shift targeting 100 schools.
The Bilateral Discussion will continue till 27th September 2025 with Civil Society, District Oversight Committee Members, Non-state actors and the media in attendance to scrutinise the budget of various MDAs
