Many African countries have taken policy measures since the 2008 food crisis to palliate the negative effects of the food price hikes. Consequently, rice is being treated as a priority staple commodity. The various actions taken have now started to yield some results. Analysis of rice sector aggregate performance over selected periods shows significant progress of the basic indicators, including rice production. From a critical look at milled-rice production statistics based on USDA data (accessed 31 January 2013), it can be seen that since 2008, rice production has been progressing in both sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and Africa as a whole. In fact, from a level of 8.4 million tonnes (Mt) of rice produced (milled-rice equivalent) in 2008, SSA has reached the level of 12.2 Mt in 2012 (18.8 Mt of paddy-rice equivalent), which is an increase of 45%. Similarly, total rice production of Africa (computed as the sum of SSA and North African production) has grown from 13.0 Mt in 2008 to 16.5 Mt in 2012 (a 27% increase). Analysis of the production growth rates was performed taking into account three main periods: before the rice crisis, after rice crisis, and a composite period which include both before and after rice crisis data series. For both SSA and Africa, the best rice production growth periods were 2007-2010 and 2007-2012, while North Africa (with Egypt being the main production driver) had negative growth rates. Rice production growth rates through the selected periods indicate that SSA has grown to a rate close to 10% over the period 2007-2010, slightly greater than the growth rate (8.39%) for the period 2007-2012. However, production in SSA grew relatively slowly between 2010 and 2012 at a rate of 2.29%, mainly as a result of various weather factors such as floods and drought. The significant rice production increase in SSA is the result of important increases in rice production in some countries that registered double-digit production growth rates over 2007-2012. Of