AAIN Agribusiness Incubation Conference

7-9 March. Dakar, Senegal. AAIN Agribusiness Incubation Conference. This year’s theme was “Youth engagement in agribusiness trade and investment”.

AAIN CEO, Alex Ariho, emphasised that the agribusiness conference was designed to bring together incubators and enable them to share, interrogate and shift promising practices to good practices in agribusiness, a sector touted to reach a market value of US$1 trillion (€0.8 trillion) in Africa by 2030.

"Agribusiness creates more jobs than any other sector so it should be top of the agenda for Africa's economic transformation. Agribusiness is a driver of agriculture productivity and agriprenuers need the  experience of what it means to deliver. Inadequate finance, limited experience, poor infrastructure and lack of specific entrepreneurial training are some of the major challenges to agribusiness success." Ralph Von Kaufmann, agribusiness mentor and consultant

Extracts of the programme:
Panel Discussion 3: Financing Agribusinesses Incubation in Africa - Avoiding the Traps

• Solange Zwandi (Trust Africa)
• DOSSCHE Eva (Regional Director, TRIAS)
• Mamadou Gueye (Teranga Capital)
• Fiona Kyomugisha (Portfolio Manager – AECF)
• Apollo Segawa (CURAD MD)
• Mark Fynn (AUC-DREA)

Panel Discussion 6: Increasing Women’s Role in Agribusiness and Enterprise Development

• Madame Khady Fall TALL (WAWA, President)
• Charity Kruger (ED, CEARA)
• Ms. Fati N’zi-Hassane (Head of Skills & Employment for Youth Programme (NEPAD)
• Elizabeth Nsimadala (EAFF)
• Naomi Kerring (Media Agripreneur)
• Mingue Niasse (Programme Manager, Africa Lead)

Panel Discussion 7: Role of Women in Mobilising investment in Business: Landing the Next Financing in Agribusiness

• Sarah Kataike (Presidents Office, Uganda)
• Lilian Unwintwali (M-AHWII)
• Jeff Milanette (Innovative Partners)
• George Tumwesigye (AAIN)
• Maness Nkhata (Lakeshore Agro-Processing Enterprise)
• Aminata Diakite (Mali)
• Sally Walkerman (Small Foundation)

Related: 

CTA held an interactive session on how the incubation of women and youth entrepreneurs in agribusiness could be supported through ICT knowledge sharing and peer learning. As one of the co-organisers, CTA also sponsored 30 participants, comprising women and youth agripreneurs, ICT entrepreneurs, and a knowledge management team.

The themes covered in the session align with CTA's strategic interventions on youth entrepreneurship and the new project, VALUE4HER on women in agribusiness. CTA is also currently exploring how ICTs can specifically support agribusiness.

Related: (pre-event)

The AgriBusiness Incubation Management Training
This training targeted Agribusiness incubator managers or individuals keen to establish incubators. It was delivered by professionals and practising incubator managers who have deep experience on different models on how to set up, manage, finance an incubator, evaluate performance, and design mentoring programs. The training program was designed to be experiential and interwoven with content within the conference.

This training module was complemented by a training session on how to Establish and Manage a Small Scale Incubator Hub