RUFORUM Webinar: Engaging African Universities in Advancing Agricultural and Food and Nutrition Security in Africa: Policy Perspective

7 September 2020. RUFORUM Webinar Series 2020 - Webinar 10: Engaging African Universities in Advancing Agricultural and Food and Nutrition Security in Africa: Policy Perspective.

This RUFORUM Webinar 10 was organized to explore opportunities for coordinated engagement of African and European universities to contribute to th:

1. Development, 
2. Implementation and 
3. Evaluation of policies, strategic frameworks and funding programmes under the auspice of Africa-EU partnership.

The Webinar aimed to bring together policy leaders from African Union Commission, European Union Commission, Country Governments and other development partners to deliberate on how African universities should be engaged in a coordinated manner to contribute during the consultations to design programmes, implementation of these programmes and their review.

Universities are well placed to provide technical expertise in generating evidence for policy making through policy research, in implementing and generating evidence from practice for improvement of Africa-Europe partnership strategic frameworks, policies and programmes, such as “Comprehensive strategy with Africa”, the European Green Deal and its Farm to Fork Strategy, the Research and Innovation Partnership Roadmaps for Food Nutrition and Sustainable Agriculture (FNSSA) and Climate Change and Sustainable Energy Access (CCSE), among others. 

While university professors have been contributing to these efforts individually, a coordinated continent wide engagement of universities will yield better results. Coordinated and organized approach will make it easier to mobilise and generate continent wide input in the strategic documents as well as prepare both universities and research institutions to effectively and jointly deliver the aspirations of the EU-Africa partnership.

Speakers:

• Moderator: Dr. Godfrey Bahiigwa, Director of Agriculture, African Union Commission, Addis Ababa-Ethiopia 
• Discussant: Dr. Patrick Okori, Country Director, ICRISAT, Lilongwe Malawi 
• H.E Ambassador Josefa LC Sacko, Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture (DREA), African Union Commission, Addis Ababa-Ethiopia 
• H.E Thoko Didiza, Minister for Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development, Pretoria South Africa 
• Hon. Lobin Lowe, Minister of Agriculture, Lilongwe-Malawi 
• Hon. Jeanine Milly Cooper, Minister of Agriculture, Monrovia-Liberia 
• Dr Leonard Miizzi, Food Security Head of Unit, EU, Brussels-Belgium

Questions of the panel discussion:

• What are the key research issues that should be addressed in the implementation of the Food Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture?
• How has the European Union supported Africa in addressing FNSSA challenges? 
• How are universities engaged in the development of policies, strategic frameworks, Roadmaps/plans and programmes developed and implemented under the Africa-EU partnership? 
• What modalities should be employed at national and regional level to engage universities and improve the Africa-EU partnership programmes and projects? 

Related:

PANAP: The Pan-African Network for economic Analysis of Policies

Under the aegis of the African Union (AU) - European Union (EU) partnership, the:
Department of Rural Economy and Agriculture of the African Union Commission (DREA-AUC) ,
European Commission (EC) - Joint Research Centre (JRC), with the contribution of:
European Commission - Directorate-General for Development and Cooperation (DG DEVCO),
European Commission - Directorate-General for Agriculture and Rural Development (DG AGRI), have established the Pan-African Network for economic Analysis of Policies (PANAP network).

• PANAP is a network among academic/research and institutional partners collaborating with the European Commission - JRC in developing research on agricultural economics and policy issues with a focus on Africa. 
• PANAP aims to strengthen the liaison between researchers/scientists and policymakers in Africa, and to stimulate their cooperation on selected topics linked to policy priorities that reinforce the stability of agriculture and food sectors in Africa. 
• It will also help achieve the sustainability of the agri-food sectors to enhance food and nutrition security in alignment with the Malabo Declaration Commitment 3 on ending hunger in Africa by 2025 and Sustainable Development Goal 2 (SDG2 - Zero Hunger).
• PANAP is part of the Action Agenda of the Political Declaration of the 3rd AU-EU Agriculture Ministerial Conference held in Rome on 21 June 2019, and is conceived in the framework of the Africa-Europe agenda for rural transformation - Task force rural Africa.

2 September 2020. In the context of PANAP, the Pan-African Network for economic Analysis of Policies, a new study about fertilizer policy reforrms to enhance food security in Kenya, is online at https://doi.org/10.1080/00036846.2020.1808180.

7 September 2020. Questionnaire to suppliers in the agricultural and food supply chain on unfair trading practices (UTPs) (deadline 31/01/2021)

• On 17 April 2019, the European Parliament and the Council adopted Directive (EU) 2019/633 on unfair trading practices (UTPs) in business-to-business relationships in the agricultural and food supply chain. To assess the effectiveness of measures taken by Member States in the context of this Directive, the Commission will carry out annual surveys, starting with this baseline questionnaire that aims at capturing the state of play before these new national measures are implemented.
• This survey by the Joint Research Centre and the Directorate-General for Agriculture and Rural Development of the European Commission is carried out across all Member States