ARD Innovation & private sector engagement

26 November 2015. Johannesburg, South Africa. CAAST-Net Plus hosted a workshop on Africa-EU cooperation in food and nutrition security.

The Africa-EU STI cooperation in Food and Nutrition Security: Innovation and Private Sector Engagement workshop aimed to learn more about the opportunities and challenges faced by innovators in the area of food and nutrition security, while exploring how to better take into account the interests of entrepreneurs in an EU-African Research and Innovation Platform on Food and Nutrition Security.

The workshop address the following key questions:

• What does innovation in food and nutrition security mean in the African context?
• What possibilities exist for potential collaboration?
• What are the obstacles and opportunities encountered by innovators?
• How can the private sector be involved in Africa-EU food and nutrition security collaboration?
• What are the challenges and opportunities of Inter Partes Review-Patenting in the food and nutrition security sector?

The event was organised by the CAAST-Net Plus partner: France's Institute for Research and Development (IRD), and was held in conjunction with the Africa Techno Forum which took place
from 23-27 November in Johannesburg and Pretoria.

Africa-Techno is an annual forum about innovation, where technologies developed in Africa and Europe are showcased. The event is organised by CVT Valorisation Sud, France, in collaboration with a number of South African and international partners, and targets investors, researchers and inventors.

“While we have a very practiced narrative about the role that scientific and technological research plays in inspiring or driving innovation for economic growth, and a persistent anxiety about a perceived weakness in the academia or research – business relationship, a striking reality emerging from this exchange was that for many small– and medium–sized enterprises in the food and nutrition security and agriculture domain, and the small scale entrepreneurs, the link to the scientific and technological environment can be a distant one,” says CAAST-Net Plus coordinator Dr Andrew Cherry

“The scientific or technological dimension of a new product or of a new service is just one of so many pressing practical issues facing SMEs and entrepreneurs and it is unrealistic to expect SMEs and entrepreneurs to share our perspectives. We who inhabit the world of international scientific cooperation must never lose sight of these realities and can ill afford to isolate the S&T contribution from host the of other factors driving business ideas,” Cherry adds.

• Follow @CAAST_Net_Plus for live updates from the workshop
• Workshop agenda
• Go to CAAST-Net Plus Africa Techno event announcement
  

Presentations
Innovative funding methods in agriculture, challenges and opportunities in patenting traditional African foods, and funding opportunities for EU-Africa research collaboration in food and nutrition security were amongst the key topics from the roundtable discussion.

• Challenges and Opportunities of Intellectual Property Rights in the Food and Nutrition Sector Security - At van Rooy, Kisch IP, South Africa
• Guanomad's Contribution to Food and Nutrition Security - Erick Rajaonary, Guanomad, Madagascar
• Innovative funding for agribusiness SMEs - Francois Stepman, PAEPARD
• Opportunities for Joint_Africa-EU Science, Technology and Innovation Collaboration in Food Security - Judith Ann Francis, the Technical Centre for Rural and Agricultural Development (CTA), Netherlands
• Upcycling AgriWaste: Independent Collaborative Research Stories - Taslim Owonikoko, Berekotry, Nigeria
• What is Innovation for Africa in Food and Nutrition Security - Prof Mady Cisse, Université Cheikh Anta Diop de Dakar (UCAD), Senegal

Extracts of the programme:

Presentation on EU Funding opportunities for innovative projects in the Food and Nutrition Security sector by Francois Stepman (PAEPARD)

 

Presentation of innovative projects in the Food and Nutrition Security area

Presentation of the FP7 EU project AFTER (Senegal) by M. Mady Cisse
Presentation of  Guanomad (Madagascar) by  Erick RAJAONARY

Berekotry Ltd (Nigeria) by T.Owonikoko. He presented biodiesel made from carbs and vegetable oils.

• Berekotry Ltd  is a multiple award winning private African start-up with more than a decade of R and D exploits and success stories with Multiple Patent that cover the biobased related industrial products' development. 
• The company is engaging in both the pyrolytic and Non pyrolytic conversion of agro cellulose materilas to several industrial products that are applicable in Automotive, Semiconductor, coatings,Lubricants, biolpolymers, wood preservatives,Leather processing, Life Sciences etc 
• Berekotry Limited and its passionate President and Chemical Engineer of more than 20 years innovation experience Mr Taslim Owonikoko are soul mates and it is difficult to separate him from his company or his numerous landmark inventions and Agro-based industrial innovations. 
• He is an energetic, inspiring, and talented enterprising inventor, who sees and understands exactly what Nigerians and the global community need to oil the wheel of innovation system. 
• He has garnered numerous awards from within and outside Nigeria In the last couple of years . Some of which are, Innocentive-MIT-CBS Gift Certificate Award , USA, National Gold Innovation Award, Nigeria , Global Top 100 Best Innovators by General Electric Ecomagination Challenge, USA and recently capped with the Best Award Winner on National Science and Innovation awarded by the Federal Ministry Of Science and Technology in Conjunction with United Nations Development Program in Nigeria 2013. 
• He has been nominated on industrial/Innovation tours to South Korea, India , Ethiopia 
• The company's Ceo emerged as one of the top Global R and D innovators awarded by General Electric (USA) of the GE ecomagination Challenge for his novel work on bio reinforced critical material alternative in the production of power semiconductors. 
• The company was a finalist at the 2010 United Nations Science With Africa Challenge, Addis Ababa Ethiopia. 
• The company emerged the best Federal Government and UNDP-Award sponsored Innovative company in Nigeria 2007 and 2014.
• See also: The Vanguard 16/04/2012: I convert agric waste to industrial products – Engr. Taslim Owonikoko

THE VIDEO CLIP below shows the application of agro-biomass waste based oil spill cleaning product at mopping up crude oil spill on surface of water . The product works effectively in acidified, saline and fresh water bodies . The recovered oil in sludge with the Inert-mopping agent is ready for the refinery for fractional distillation, so no waste.

Related:
16 to 18 October 2015. Rome, Italy. Berekotry Ltd was the only African participation to the Maker Faire Rome – The European Edition 2015. Maker Faire is a showcase of invention, creativity and resourcefulness, and a celebration of the Maker Movement.

Seeds without borders

16-20th November 2015. Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. ILRI Campus. A week-long workshop co-organized by Bioversity International and the ABS Capacity Development Initiative, in cooperation with the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources, the Convention on Biological Diversity, the African Union, the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security and the Japan Biodiversity Fund.

11 African countries gathered to implement seed sharing and use, to adapt to climate change, ensure food security and alleviate poverty. Interdisciplinary teams from Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Mali, Malawi, Senegal and Uganda spent the week working together to set their country roadmaps for embedding the sustainable use of plant genetic resources into the heart of national development plans.

Two international agreements govern how countries exchange seeds beyond their borders – the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (Plant Treaty) and the Nagoya Protocol. But to implement these agreements at the country level is not always straightforward as Michael Halewood, Bioversity International, explains:

“What we saw last week is the importance of bringing people together from different focal areas of responsibility that do not normally work together. For example, focal points from the agricultural and the environment sector sat together with their finance and planning, GEF* and climate change focal points, to develop national roadmaps to address to address climate change adaptation, access and benefit-sharing associated with genetic resources. This is significant. If countries are to make the most out of the biological diversity that they have at their disposal, and that they can get from other places, they’ve got to implement these agreements together.”

“It is really important for African countries to think through how to bring access and benefit-sharing (ABS) into the national implementation processes in a coherent way. Since the beginnings of agriculture farmers and local communities have exchanged their seeds to improve and diversify crops they grow to adapt to changing conditions. These days, we are all faced with new environmental challenges, such as increased flooding, heat and drought - and that is why everyone needs crop diversity: to be able to maintain food security for everyone.” Andreas Drews, ABS Capacity Development Initiative

As part of the week’s activities, the participants were invited to attend the African Union Commission (AU) to discuss the opportunities and constraints of implementing the two agreements.

European Forum on Agricultural Research for Development Annual Technical and Business Meeting

23-24 November 2015. Brussels. This year’s annual technical meeting provided a platform for
reflection and learning by showcasing ongoing policy and programme initiatives and success stories of research and innovation partnerships, agricultural entrepreneurship and institutional realignment for increasing the impact of research on socio-economic development.

Objectives

• To deliberate on mechanisms for strengthening the links between research,
• innovation and entrepreneurship for achieving societal and economic transformation
• through agriculture
• EFARD road map on research, innovation and entrepreneurship for increasing the
• impact of agricultural research for development.

Background:

In June 2015, EFARD endorsed a new management team to lead the organization for the next two years (2015-2017). Between July and August 2015, the EFARD management team updated the EFARD membership database and solicited feedback on priority areas for the future. EFARD also launched an exercise to map all European stakeholders involved in agriculture and nutrition projects as well as European CSOs. At international level, the GFAR Constituent Assembly took place in

August 2015 and EFARD had the opportunity to share its position. The Annual Business meeting discussed these and other developments and review and update the EFARD 2013-2015 governance document and identified the strategies on the way forward for enhancing EFARD’s visibility, relevance, operations and growth strategy & for strengthening partnerships with SCAR/ARCH, CGIAR, and other GFAR regional platforms.

Extract of the presentations:

The EC’s Agriculture Finance Initiative (AgriFi) – Mr. Regis Meritan, Head of Sector Agricultural Growth, DG for International Cooperation and Development (DEVCO/C1), European Commission, Belgium.

Related PAEPARD blog post: (24/08/2015)

Agrifi: investment in smallholder agriculture and agribusiness micro/ small/medium enterprises

Inter-Agency Donor Group (IADG) on pro-poor livestock research and development

18th - 20th November 2015. GIZ-House in Berlin. The “Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH” organised the 16th annual meeting of the Inter-Agency Donor Group (IADG) on pro-poor livestock research and development.

The major theme of the meeting was ‘Improving the contribution of livestock to human health, nutrition and wellbeing’. With a mix of formal presentations, structured discussions and break out groups, the meeting brought together aspects of livestock keeping and production with human nutrition and health parameters.

16th IADG Meeting Agenda

Extract of the presentations:

Parallel Session II

Understanding the livestock to nutrition pathway for better outcomes - Carmen Jaquez Land’O’Lakes

 

RELOAD: Reduction of Post-harvest Losses and Value Addition in East African Food Value Chains - Margareta Lelea Deutsches Institut für Tropische und Subtropische Landwirtschaft (DITSL), University of Kassel Margareta Lelea

Mycotoxins in animal feed: François Stepman - PAEPARD 

Parallel Session IV 

Animal source food in human nutrition. Role of dairy products in human nutrition. Presentation of the book ‘Milk and dairy products in human nutrition” - FAO Jurjen Draajier

Role of informal markets in the dairy sector. Towards professionalizing, not criminalizing, informal sellers of milk and meat in poor countries. Recent ILRI and IFPRI research. - ILRI Kristina
Roesel

 

Related PAEPARD blogpost:
Wednesday, January 28, 2015 Food safety and informal markets: Animal products in sub-Saharan

Food safety and informal markets: Animal products in sub-Saharan Africa. 

London, UK: Routledge.

ILRI/CTA
Roesel, K. and Grace, D. 2014.

284 pages

Animal products are vital components of the diets and livelihoods of people across sub-Saharan Africa. They are frequently traded in local, unregulated markets and this can pose significant health risks. This volume presents an accessible overview of these issues in the context of food safety, zoonoses and public health, while at the same time maintaining fair and equitable livelihoods for poorer people across the continent. 

The book includes a review of the key issues and 25 case studies of the meat, milk, egg and fish food sectors drawn from a wide range of countries in East, West and Southern Africa, as part of the "Safe Food, Fair Food" project. It describes a realistic analysis of food safety riskby developing a methodology of ‘participatory food safety risk assessment’, involving small-scale producers and consumers in the process of data collection in a data-poor environment often found in developing countries. This approach aims to ensure market access for poor producers, while adopting a realistic and pragmatic strategy for reducing the risk of food-borne diseases for consumers.

Food Security & Climate Change and the role of private companies

9 November 2015. Brussels. Mission of Switzerland to the EU. With a special focus on the example of Africa, this Partners in Dialogue tackled these questions and offered insight into specific projects dealing with this complex issue.

Climate change is already having a negative impact on food security, affecting agriculture, major crops, livestock production and fisheries. There is a growing awareness of the urgent need to adapt current food systems to a changing climate, in order to feed the growing population in a sustainable manner. To achieve this in practice, agricultural productivity needs to increase alongside better food systems efficiency and protection of ecosystems.

How can Europe, Switzerland and the international community face the challenges posed by climate change to agriculture and food security? How can public policies stimulate progress on green growth in the agricultural sector more effectively? What more can the private sector do to synergize climate change and food security action?

Panel discussion: (from left to right on the picture)

• Moderator Mr Ewald Wermuth ECDPM Director
• Ms Gerda Verburg, Chair of the Global Agenda Council on Food and Nutrition Security (WEF) 
• Ambassador Pio Wennubst, Assistant Director General, Head of the Global Cooperation Department at the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) 
• Dr Karen Cooper,  Nutrition and Sustainability, Nestlé 
• Dr Roberto Ridolfi,  Director Directorate C - Sustainable Growth and Development, DG DEVCO 

Resources:

09/11/2015 Concept NotePartners in DialogueLinking Food Security and Climate Change: what role for the private sector? , ECDPM, 9 pages

Extract: (page 8) Can development partners do more for sustainable agriculture as part of their ‘private sector for development’ (PSD) approaches? How can PSD effectively differentiate and support companies of different kind, size, and location in the greening of agriculture? What can donors do to address the concerns about the fact that their initiatives to involve investors from their own countries in African agriculture is used as self-interested ‘economic diplomacy’ at the expense of sustainable development objectives? Can this debated be depolarised through better evidence-based public-private dialogue? 

05/11/2015 Knaepen, H., Torres, C., Rampa, F. 2015. Making agriculture in Africa climate-smart: From continental policies to local practices. (Briefing Note 80). ECDPM Maastricht, 19 pages

Extract: Investing in climate-sensitive agriculture is an opportunity for the private sector to make sustainable profits. But governments and financial partners should create an enabling environment and provide financial incentives to mitigate risks especially for small and medium enterprises (SMEs). SMEs can better address opportunities in local markets and can better adapt climate smart technologies to local markets.

Annual Action Programme for the food and nutrition security & sustainable agriculture

5 November 2015. The Annual Action Programme for the food and nutrition security and sustainable agriculture component of the Global Public Goods and Challenges thematic programme  2015 to be financed under the EC Development Cooperation Instrument was adopted last August and is now published.

It provides more than € 228 million to the following programmes: 

1. Land Governance Programme
   This programme supports the responsible governance of land tenure by promoting the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the context of national food security (VGGT). The programme is countrybased, responding to needs in 8 countries (Cameroon, Ghana, Guinea Bissau, Sudan, Uganda, Pakistan, Brazil and Colombia). In addition support will be provided to the International Land Coalition because of the importance of civil society to land governance and to the Land Matrix Initiative, recognising the need for information and data on land deals. Monitoring of progress of the in-country projects and exploring lessons learned for the further promotion of the VGGT will be ensured by FAO. 
2. Inclusive and Sustainable Value Chains and Food Fortification
   This multi-country programme focuses on 60 countries with food and nutrition security and sustainable agriculture as a focal sector in cooperation with the EU and with high levels of undernutrition. It supports the development of inclusive, sustainable agriculture based value chains and the strengthening of evidence and access to fortified food. The programme will be implemented through a mix of modalities including technical assistance, call for proposals and blending
3. The National Information Platforms for Nutrition (NIPN)
   This multi-country programme is currently setting-up of Information Platforms in Ethiopia, Bangladesh, Burundi, Niger, Kenya and Laos. The programme will be extended to more countries as soon as financial resources are available and interest is expressed by countries. This action aims to improve partner country capacity for collecting and using nutrition information.  The primary goal of this EU partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is to join forces to implement the NIPN in order to improve accountability and governance on nutrition. They will provide $500,000 dollars for the initiative. The UK's Department for International Development will also support the initiative with £6.4 million.
4. Pro-Resilience Action (PRO-ACT-2015)
   This programme covers interventions in West Africa, Syria, Nigeria, Burundi, Gambia, Sudan, DPR Korea, Cape Verde, responding to major post-food crises, promoting structural and resilient actions, and building capacity of public institutions and private organisations to respond to food crises. The direct focus of these actions is on long-term solutions to food crises. The programme will be implemented using a variety of modalities.

West Africa campaign of preservation of peasant seeds

4 November 2015. We are the Solution: African Women Organize for Land and Seed Sovereignty is a campaign in West Africa led by rural women to promote ancestral knowledge and put pressure on governments to take seriously the preservation of agriculture. 

The campaign seeks to uphold traditional knowledge, which supports food sovereignty and the preservation of peasant seeds, restore national policies favorable to agroecological peasant farming, and promote African agricultural production.

The a campaign is led by rural women from Senegal, Burkina Faso, Mali, Ghana and Guinea. 

This is the first article in a 7-part series which features interviews with grassroots African leaders working for seed and food sovereignty, the decolonization of Africa's food system, and the preservation of traditional farming practices. This series is made possible with support from New Field Foundation and Grassroots International. Many thank to Stephen Bartlett for translation of the interview.

In Casamance [Senegal], We Are the Solution has established a platform of 100 grassroots associations. There is a model farm field and a store for marketing family farm products from various kinds of production and hand-tool farming. The store is there to help promote ecologically produced products produced by women. We Are the Solution is also trying to organize a forum on local consumption.

HORTINLEA: Connecting Innovators of African Leafy Vegetables in Kenya

Connecting Innovators, Making Pro-Poor Solutions Work

The Innovation System of African Leafy Vegetables in Kenya

164 pages

Since July, 2013 HORTINLEA is coordinating a research project which is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Research, Education and Technology (BMBF) within the Programme “GlobaE – Global Food Security”.

The project HORTINLEA (Horticultural Innovations and Learning for Improved Nutrition and Livelihood in East Africa) is a cooperation of 19 German and East African universities and research institutes. In the frame of the project, they have conducted a new study analysing innovation processes along the value chain of African Indigenous Vegetables in Kenya focusing on their potential to alleviate poverty and malnutrition through income generation and/or improved supply of essential nutrients for the rural and urban poor.

Furthermore, the study focuses on how good agricultural practices and other relevant information and knowledge are shared between stakeholders such as farmers, researchers, development actors and policy-makers.

Third edition of the Food Processing & Packaging Exposyum

3 - 5 November 2015. Nairobi.  The Food Processing & Packaging Exposyum (FPPE) Kenya 2015 is organized by Messe Düsseldorf. Enterprises from ten nations are showcasing their solutions and products. The exhibition is accompanied by a three-day conference at which the theme of SAVE FOOD will play an important role.

1. Government and trade association topics head the agenda at the beginning of the three-day programme
   Extract: TECHNOLOGY FOR PEOPLE - KENYA AS PARTNER OF GERMAN MANUFACTURERS OF FOOD PROCESSING AND PACKING MACHINERY
   Martina Claus, Head of Market Development Africa / VDMA, Germany
2. The second day devotes mainly to the topic of food losses. This part of the program was organized by the partners of the SAVE FOOD Initiative, the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and Messe Düsseldorf.
   Extract: SPEAKER 2: IMPROVING RURAL SOYABEAN PRODUCERS’ INCOMES THROUGH PROCESSING AND PACKAGING IN BENIN Patrice Lagnon Sewade, Managing Director/AGRIPAT INDUSTRY, Benin
3. Adequate processing and packaging solutions are key in fighting food losses, particularly in the Sub-Saharan countries where these losses are often caused by the lack of suitable means to process, store and transport harvested produce. For this reason, the third and last day of the symposium  concentrates on technology and knowledge transfer in these areas.

See: Conference Programme (468.2 KB)

Presentation by M. Patrice Lagnon SEWADE, Agro-industrial Coordinator of SOJAGNON, a consortium supported by PAEPARD since 2010.

Related:

 

African Investment and Energy Forum

27 - 29 October 2015. African Investment and Energy Forum. The Africa`s leading B2G and B2B Exhibition and Conference adressses Africa's most important business topics by international experts and well known personalities. The AIF is the only one of its kind to take place in the AFRICAN UNION Conference Center.

Extract of the program

• Private Sector and Development Cooperation in practice (Judith Helfmann-Hundack, Foreign Trade and Development Policy, AfrikaVerein der deutschen Wirtschaft e.V. 
• The dual approach - the German experience in vocational training in Subshara Africa (Ingo Badoreck - Country Director – Delegation of German Industry and Commerce in Kenya) 
• Investment opportunities in Agribusiness: The East Africa experience (Kanini Mutooni – USAID East Africa Trade and Investment Hub Director, Investment, ICT) 
• Agricultural Wastes as Source of Energy and Income: Making Agriculture More Attractive and Rewarding (Abdulkadir Hassan - ZHE Africa)

Panel Discussion International Investment in Agriculture – along the value chain

• Lutz Hartmann - General Manager, FruitBox Africa GmbH and Partner Belmont Legal. 
• Dr. Ferdinand Schmitz, Managing Director, German Seed Alliance 
• Henk-Jan Voskuil, General Manager Dümmen Orange   
• Asmau Nitardy – Manager East Africa & Agribusiness, Afrika-Verein der deutschen Wirtschaft e.V.) 

“AFRICA FINLAND INVESTMENT RELATION” 

• Business partners from Finland – government supported Matchmaking - program of Finnpartnership (Birgit Nevala - MA, Business Partnership Coordinator, Finnpartnership) 
• Financing and investments from Finland to Africa (Jussi Ahonen – Investment Manager – Manufacturing and Services Finnish Fund for Industrial Cooperation Ltd (FINNFUND)

“AFRICA TURKEY INVESTMENT RELATION” 

• M. Rizanur Meral – President of TUSKON 

The German-Africa Business Association, which comprises 600 German companies with an interest in Africa, offers a platform for establishing contacts and exchanging information and opinions.

• Association Foreign Trade and Development Policy Head Judith Helfmann-Hundack said that they have come with the business delegation for the first time following Prime Minister Hailemariam Dessalegn's visit to Germany last December.
• She indicated that there are good opportunities in Ethiopia especially in the agriculture sector. Anything to do with manufacturing and processing agricultural products, packaging them to transport is an important and interesting points to consider, she said. "It's a right time to be here."
• The visiting delegation, which all hailed from agribusiness sector, participated in the African Investment and Energy Forum and many more German companies outside of the delegation 

Louis Dreyfus creates investment fund for agribusiness in Sub-Saharan Africa

28 October 2015. GENEVA, SWITZERLAND — Louis Dreyfus Holding and Bamboo Finance announced a partnership to launch and jointly manage NISABA, a $50 million impact investment fund project with a focus on small- and medium-sized agribusiness enterprises in Sub-Saharan Africa.

NISABA will target a balanced portfolio of countries, activities and commodities, and will invest in financing gaps across the agribusiness value chain in growth markets. The focus will be on businesses that combine social, environmental and financial returns by improving efficiency through access to data, finance and risk mitigation, training and technology innovation; strengthening market access by linking producers to end-consumers; and building local capacity through post-harvest handling and storage, value-addition or processing solutions, among others. More information is available on www.nisabafund.com.

Korea-Africa Food & Agriculture Cooperation Initiative

A researcher at the Rural Development Administration (RDA) 

shows how to operate a machine to process harvested crops in 

Zimbabwe on May 13, 2015. / Courtesy of RDA

3 November 2015. The Rural Development Administration (RDA), the state-run agricultural research institute of South Korea, has been operating three consultative groups for Asia, Africa and South America to offer more tailored, field-oriented help to farmers there.

In July 2010, RDA launched the Korea-Africa Food & Agriculture Cooperation Initiative (KAFACI) with 19 countries across the continent including Ethiopia, Cameroon, Angola and Uganda. It has provided information on how to cope effectively with diseases and pests affecting rice and other crops. It has also transferred a wide range of agricultural techniques to increase production, develop disease-resistant crops and manufacture and operate farm machinery.

The RDA's Korea Project on International Agriculture (KOPIA) centers have been implementing the initiatives. There are 6 KOPIA centers in Africa.

"Many African countries want to learn how to successfully advance their agriculture and improve living conditions in rural communities. Through the initiative, we have built a win-win system with our counterparts in Africa."

Enabling small and medium agribusinesses to unlock development

3 November 2015. The report, Strengthening the first mile: Enabling small and medium agribusinesses to unlock development in Tanzania, Uganda and Kenya, (PDF 2.6MB) was launched at a symposium held in Nairobi celebrating Farm Africa’s 30th anniversary.

The symposium brought together representatives from businesses and NGOs across Kenya to discuss how to strengthen markets for rural smallholders in eastern Africa.

• This new report highlights how support to small and medium agriculture businesses is key to driving rural economic development in East Africa.
• These ‘first mile’ businesses play a vital role in connecting small-scale farming to wider markets by buying their produce or supplying goods to them. However, the first mile market is failing due to a lack of appropriate financial products for agricultural small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
• Without the finance they need to invest, professionalise or develop, the growth of agricultural SMEs is being stifled, as is the productivity and profitability of smallholders who depend on their services. 
• Agricultural SMEs are being held back by a ‘missing middle’ of suitable financial products.
  
  They tend to be too big for small-scale loans offered by microfinance institutions and others, but too small to be able to borrow money from commercial lenders affordably and viably. There is therefore a need to find alternative financing mechanisms suitable for agribusiness SMEs.

The report sets out the business case for Farm Africa’s Maendeleo Agricultural Enterprise Fund (MAEF), a venture philanthropy programme that addresses this critical financing gap. MAEF provides working capital and support in agronomy, business and marketing to first mile rural enterprises that in turn enable African smallholders to lift themselves out of poverty. To learn more about MAEF, visit its dedicated website.

Related:

Farm Africa has appointed Nicolas Mounard as its new Chief Executive. Nicolas is currently the Managing Director of Twin and Twin Trading and brings with him tremendous experience in developing and managing long term agricultural programmes in developing countries. Nicolas will join Farm Africa on 22 February 2016, taking over from the current Chief Executive Nigel Harris who will be leaving this month.

Related:
25/10/2015. Spintelligent, a major business consultancy in sub-Saharan Africa, is helping to organise the next AgriBusiness Congress East Africa set for next January 2016 in Dar es Salaam.

6th Africa Day of Food and Nutrition Security

28-30 October 2015. Kampala. The Africa Day for Food and Nutrition Security (ADFNS) was commemorated on the continent of Africa with continental level celebrations held in Uganda.

The 6th ADFNS gave a special focus to women under the theme “Empowering Our Women, Securing Our Food, Improving Our Nutrition”, in line with the declaration by the African Union of 2015 as the “Year of Women Empowerment and Development towards Africa’s Agenda 2063”.

Building on the selected theme, the following four sub-themes represented the areas of technical and policy discussions:

1. Sub-theme 1: Accelerated action toward improved maternal, adolescent and young child nutrition
2. Sub-theme 2: Harnessing opportunities for production, access and consumption of nutritious, safe and diverse diets
3. Sub-theme 3: Improving and promoting small holder farmers’, particularly women farmers’ capacity to access markets
4. Sub-theme 4: Strengthening institutional capacities and systems, partnerships and knowledge sharing for enhanced delivery of food and nutrition security interventions

Since 2010, at the 15th Ordinary Session of the African Union Summit, the African Union announced that 30 October will be recognized each year as the ADFNS. The ADFNS provides a platform at national, regional and continental levels to share experiences, knowledge and mutual learning, as well as measure progress in assuring food and nutrition security for all by governments and multi-stakeholder partners.

Related: 

28 October 2015. Launch of the Agriculture to Nutrition Initiative - ATONU

Led by the South Africa-based Food, Agriculture and Natural Resources Policy Analysis Network (FANRPAN), the regional initiative ATONU answers the question of what agriculture programs can do to achieve positive nutrition outcomes. 

FANRPAN has assembled a leading global consortium of African and international organizations to design, pilot, rigorously evaluate and promote a range of interventions that will improve nutritional outcomes of agricultural programs and policies. The interventions address the variety of social, cultural and environmental contexts found in African agriculture.
Objectives

The ATONU project provides technical assistance to integrate tailored nutrition interventions into planned and ongoing agricultural investments through:

• Generating tools and frameworks for diagnosing the opportunities to incorporate tailored nutrition interventions into agriculture investments;
• Offering technical assistance for designing, testing, and rigorously monitoring and evaluating results of the tailored nutrition interventions (proof of concept)
• Documenting best practices and evidence and adding to the agriculture for nutrition knowledge base
• Advocating for evidence-based decision making at all levels



James speaking at ATONU about how FarmAfrica
is improving nutrition for sesame farmers

• Strengthening African capacity and building a community of practice in agriculture for improved nutrition.

ATONU is breaking the intergenerational cycle of under-nutrition in four Sub-Saharan African countries and improving the nutrition of smallholder farm families and poor households through tailored nutrition sensitive agriculture programs that ultimately benefit women of child bearing age and children in the first 1000 days of life after conception.

First Caribbean and Pacific Agri-Food Forum

2 - 6 November 2015. The Caribbean and Pacific Agri-Food Forum is organised by the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA), together with the Barbados Agricultural Society (BAS) and the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA), with the support of the Intra-ACP Agricultural Policy Programme.

The Forum attracted more than 250 agribusiness private sector players, decision-makers, policy-makers, financial institutions, chefs, development partners and other actors.

The event opened with a rich three-day programme of hands-on workshops and a range of meetings,
covering areas that include building a successful agribusiness company, inclusive value chain development, ICTs for fisheries, policy advocacy for Caribbean and Pacific farmers' leaders, access to finance, strengthening the link between agriculture and nutrition and successful initiatives to counter climate change. Participants are being invited to attend training sessions in social media and Web 2.0 tools and a team of young ACP social media reporters will be covering exchanges throughout the Forum.

Related:
5 - 6 November 2015. The 2nd Caribbean Agribusiness Forum – Strengthening the agri-food sector and expanding markets, will explore the main drivers of agribusiness development and highlight success stories.