Creating an International Research Consortium on Food, Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture: A Platform for Research and Innovation between Africa and Europe

13 July 2022. Creating an International Research Consortium on Food, Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture: A Platform for Research and Innovation between Africa and Europe.

• The workshop was held in a hybrid format. The physical meeting was in Brussels, Belgium.
• The workshop created awareness on the International Research Consortium (IRC), the LEAP4FNSSA platform which will be launched in September 2022.
  
• The IRC will serve as a bi-continental platform to advance FNSSA, create synergies between the many Research and Innovation (R&I) programmes, initiatives, and actors from both Europe and Africa. It will provide information on prospective partners, funding opportunities, and innovations that have worked in FNSSA.

40 participants were attending this meeting in Brussels in person and 186 participants followed the proceedings online. 

Read/download the agenda

Recording link will be posted here when available.

Welcome remarks 

• Dr. Monica Ebele-Idinoba, African Union Commission (AUC), co-Chair of the FNSSA Working Group 
• Ms. Magdalena Gajdzinska, European Commission, co-Chair of the FNSSA Working Group 
• Dr Guillermo Cardon, project officer DG Agriculture and Rural Development, European Commission, Leap4FNSSA
• Dr. Yemi Akinbamijo, Executive Director of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA)  
  

LEAP4FNSSA and the importance of building the International Research Consortium between Africa and Europe 

• Project database/ clustering, Dr. Ioannis Dimitriou, Swedish University of Agricultural Science, Sweden 
• North/ West/ East Africa engagement, Dr. Rose Omari, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, Ghana 
• Stakeholder Engagement, Dr. Maneshree Jugmohan-Naidu, Director of Biotechnology at Department of Science and Innovation, South Africa 
• FNSSA Partnership Impact Analysis, Tim Fry, The Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU) 

Presentation IRC 

• Dr. Irene Annor-Frempong, FARA, LEAP4FNSSA Coordinator

Responses to the IRC 

• Prof. Sunita Facknath, Professor in Sustainable Agriculture at the University of Mauritius 
• Mr. Ernest Aubee, Regional Agricultural Investment Programme ECOWAS head of agriculture division at the ECOWAS Commission in Abuja 
• Dr. Khalil Sangare, Permanent Interstate Committee for Drought Control in the Sahel (CILSS) 
  
• J. Dorra Fiani, Knowledge Economy Foundation, Egypt 
• Dr. Isabelle Hippolyte, Agence National de la Recherche, France 

Comment from an online participant (Barbara Adolph)

"Fragmentation is also due to funders' approaches to ARD - effectively putting people into competition with each other, whilst also fostering a 'reinventing of the wheel', as each consortium / project promises to deliver often quite ambitious / perhaps unrealistic innovation, hence reducing the incentive to adapt / improve what has been done already, in partnership with others."

Round table discussion Guests: 

• Dr. Yemi Akinbamijo, Executive Director of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA)
• Emanuele Ferrari, Pan-African Network for economic Analysis of Policies (PANAP), European Commission, Joint Research Center (JRC) 
• Maddy Newman, STAR-IDAZ International Research Consortium
• Martin Kropff, ex-CIMMYT DG, Global Director of Resilient Agrifood Systems of CGIAR
• Dr. Carlo Fadda, Biodiversity for Food and Agriculture at the Alliance of Bioversity/CIAT and Leader of the Nature+ Initiative of CGIAR 

Background:

The Long-term EU-AU Research and Innovation Partnership for Food and Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture (LEAP4FNSSA) is an European Union (EU) funded Coordination and Support Action under H2020. The overall aim of LEAP4FNSSA is to support the implementation of the African Union (AU) and EU Research and Innovation (R&I) partnership on priority 1 on Food and Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture (FNSSA). 

The expected outcome is the construction of a long-term platform that builds the backbone of the R&I Partnership by forming a multi-sectorial and multi-stakeholder community of research organisations, funders, policy makers, private sector, and civil society organisations that strive to work for Food and Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture (FNSSA). 

As the LEAP4FNSSA project is close to its end, the project’s subsequent and envisaged flagship platform will be established. Known as the International Research Consortium (IRC), will seek to serve as a bi-continental platform to advance FNSSA, create synergies between the many R&I programmes, initiatives, and actors from both Europe and Africa. It will provide information on prospective partners, funding opportunities, innovations, and policies. The platform will also boost innovations by showcasing solutions that work.