The Africa Foresight Academy has launched its virtual Food System foresight platform. This is a series of webinars engaging several hundreds of stakeholders and participants from the sub-regional agricultural research organizations implementing the EU-funded CAADP XP4 programme, as well as other organizations and individuals from academia, civil society, governmental and non-governmental agencies.
Moderating the opening session of the maiden edition of the AFA webinar, Dr. Abdulrazak Ibrahim, Capacity Development Officer at FARA, and the Focal Person for the Africa Foresight Academy, situated the foresight webinar series within the context of FARA’s approach to agricultural research interventions in response to COVID-19, indicating the three-prong steps of adapting technologies to fast-track mitigation of food shortages and extending storability, strengthening of food supply systems, trade and labour markets; as well as foresighting vulnerabilities in Africa’s food system.
Hosted by the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa, the Africa Foresight Academy (AFA) is a network of foresight practitioners at continental, sub-regional and country levels. AFA contributes to the strengthening of capacity for foresight among professionals in African AR4D institutions and private sector through sensitization, developing competencies in conducting foresight and interpretation of foresight results, offering technical assistance to enable regional and national organizations to participate in foresight initiatives and apply results from past /ongoing foresight.
FARA is a continental infrastructure for strengthening the institutional arrangements and the promotion of foresight activities on the continent in partnership with the Global Forum for Agricultural Research (GFAR). FARA’s approach to foresight seeks to foster a proactive attitude for communities faced with changes by unveiling uncertainties and using them as a means for action. The basis of foresight in agriculture in Africa is to facilitate forward-thinking capacity on how innovation and knowledge can best help surmount the diverse challenges facing agriculture, to ensure that agricultural research and innovation are more responsive to future agri-food systems and related development needs.
The AFA series of webinars is targeted at practitioners who want to better understand the impact of COVID-19 on food systems – Africa’s AR4D practitioners & stakeholders including policymakers, scientists, extension agents, researchers, development actors and affiliates of AFA. The weekly participatory webinar is hosted by Experts in Foresight backed by a Dgroup discussion and information and blogs shared on FARA and Foresight4Food websites.
The crisis has hit the supply chain really hard, affecting the flow of agro-commodities. People are too scared to visit the crowded food markets and we have no choice but to accept whatever price we are being offered.
Seyi Ajibare laments the impact of Covid-19 on her thriving agribusiness in Osun state, southwestern Nigeria. Seyi is a young female farmer specializing in the orange-fleshed sweet potato (OFSP).
Nigeria is known for its high production of root and tuber crops, such as cassava, yam and potato. The nation is one of the leading producers of potato in Sub-Saharan Africa, with an annual production of about 1.3 million tons per annum.
OFSP is one of the improved potato varieties that have been developed by scientists to enable farmers to scale up their yields and income. Since its introduction in 2015, many small- and medium-scale farmers like Seyi have adopted OFSP due to its multiple benefits, including high nutrition and health values, high yield, and growing demand among health-conscious consumers.
Seyi’s adventure into OFSP farming was inspired by some of the success stories shared by Olumide Iyanda, another young farmer in Ogun. Consequently, she started her potato farm on three-hectare farmland, aiming to generate a good return on her investment.
Like other sweet potato varieties, OFSP contributes to improved food security, and can therefore help address hunger and malnutrition. Seyi attributes the wide adoption of OFSP to its ease of planting, and the ability to grow on any type of soils with high output per unit of land. Added benefits, she explains, include high yields despite the low production costs, and early maturity of the crop. Farmers can harvest two crops a year, at around 4–6 tons per hectare. Each planting cycle lasts between three to five months.
However, the disruption caused by measures to contain the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic is limiting business opportunities for OFSP farmers. The crisis has also exposed existing gaps in the potato value chain as a whole, such as a shortage of certified OFSP seeds, and inadequate storage and processing facilities.
Seyi was getting ready to harvest her bumper crop in late March when the Covid-19 lockdown was announced. She was unable to transport most of the harvested potatoes to the large informal markets in Lagos, as planned.
Another market outlet has been disrupted by the closure of schools, she adds. “My potato farm is situated close to a university, so the staff and students patronize us regularly. But since schools have been closed, sales have declined,” she says.
Seyi now sells a bag of OFSP (which often ranges between 5,000–10,000 Naira per 100 kg bag in open markets) for less than half of the normal pre-crisis price. “Most storage facilities in my region have already been filled, leaving me with no option but to accept given prices by the consumers.” Moreover, her farm activities have been crippled by a labor shortage, as local laborers are hesitant to leave their homes amid the repeated messages about keeping social distance.
As a means to maintain her potato farming business, Seyi is hoping to adopt new technologies, and explore value addition through potato processing and preservation, even as she strives to identify other sustainable market opportunities.
In the meantime, OFSP farmers can only hope that interventions from the potato farmers association of Nigeria (POFAN) will be quick and adequately distributed.
This article is part of Covid-19 Food/Future, an initiative aiming to provide a unique and direct insight into the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on national and local food systems. Central to our approach are the experiences of young, urban and peri-urban farmers, street vendors and informal retailers, and low-income consumers. ThinkTank for Sustainability (www.tmg-thinktank.com), or on Twitter @TMG_think. Funding for this initiative is provided by BMZ, the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development.
The global pandemic has made it difficult for some African seed companies to produce and import sufficient quantities of quality certified seeds, prompting fears about food security.
A labor shortage, border closures and restrictions on movements have contributed to the challenges that some companies are facing as they struggle to get quality seeds to farmers as the planting season kicks in across the continent.
The situation is raising fears that farm productivity will decline and threaten food security, as seed shortages are predicted for most staple crops.
“COVID-19 came at a time when a lot of the seed companies were preparing to clean their seeds, or preparing to import,” Augusta Nyamadi Clottey, executive secretary of the National Seed Trade Association of Ghana (NASTAG), explained. “The lockdown came in March. And we were supposed to start planting in March. Most of the seeds we were expecting from outside have not come in.”
Ghana imports a lot of its improved vegetable and other seeds, as well as other agricultural inputs, from Europe, Asia and America. These products are now more expensive to bring in because borders have been closed to commercial flights.
“Now, instead of passenger flight, you have to rent a flight,” Clottey said. “And that is adding to the cost. Cost difference is about 15 to 20 percent. Unfortunately, the seed company has to bear all this cost. It means profit margins are decreasing, production cost is increasing.”
Even local seed companies that produce certified seeds for sale to farmers are struggling to get labor to operate smoothly because of COVID-19.
“Most companies who were cleaning their seeds use labor. The final thing is done by human beings. And because of lockdown, and with COVID, they are not getting people to do the cleaning. Even picking seeds in the field is a challenge. So, if we are not careful, quality may be compromised at a point in time,” she said in a webinar session on the impact of COVID-19 on the seed industry that was organized by the Alliance for Green Revolution in Africa.
“In Upper East Region, one company uses 150 women to do the final cleaning of the seed,” she added. “Now they are getting only 25 people. Labor is a real challenge. Most of the laborers in the south come from the north and cannot come down south now because of COVID. Most of those in the north come from across the border, Burkina Faso, but are unable to come from across the border now to work because border is closed.”
Several other parts of Africa are facing challenges with producing quality seeds for farmers as a result of the pandemic. Quoting forecasts by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and other sub-regional bodies, CORAF — an association of national agricultural and research organizations of 22 West and Central African countries — predicts COVID will cause a shortfall of certified seeds of various staple crops for the 2020 cropping season across the sub-region. Crops to be affected include maize, sorghum, millet, cowpea and groundnuts.
Cowpea, for example, is a popular food high in protein which is consumed by about 200 million people in Africa. Demand for certified cowpea seeds for the 2020 crop season in Mali, Nigeria, Niger, Togo, Côte d’Ivoire, Chad, Cape Verde and Gambia is projected at 150,000 metric tons. But CORAF projects only 2,800 metric tons of certified cowpea seeds will be available for the 2020 cropping season in these countries because of COVID-19. There is also shortage in certified groundnut seeds. The Sahel Region of West Africa needs 250,000 metric tons of certified groundnut seeds for the 2020 crop season. But only 5,000 metric tons are projected to be available.
In 12 West African countries, including Benin, Guinea, Gambia, Senegal and Cape Verde, less than 10,000 metric tons of certified sorghum and millet seeds will be available in the 2020 cropping season, falling far short of a projected demand of 100,000 metric tons, according to CORAF. And although these countries will need 200,000 metric tons of certified maize seeds, only 70,000 metric tons will be available during the current cropping season.
“Unless swift action is taken to facilitate producers’ access to seeds and other inputs, the disruptions caused by COVID-19 will inevitably lead to a decrease in agricultural production due to the unavailability of required quality seeds to plant at the right time.” CORAF cautions. “Concerted effort should be made to ensure the availability and access to certified seeds of major staple food crops in the ECOWAS and Sahel region to avert the looming consequences of the negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on agricultural production.”
Certified seeds are high quality seeds produced under strict standards by licensed seed firms to ensure they have high germination and productivity rates. The use of low-quality seeds is known to be responsible for low productivity on farms across Africa. More than 70 percent of farmers on the continent still do not have access to improved, quality seeds. In the absence of high-quality seeds because of COVID-19, productivity on farms is likely to hit rock bottom and make it more difficult for farmers to feed themselves and their families.
“It is a universal truism that quality seeds exert profound influence on agricultural productivity, enhancing yield sometimes by as much as 20 to 25 percent, or even more, if deployed in the context of an improved input package,” Josiah Wobil, chairman of Ghana’s National Seed Council, observed. “We had been making very good progress until this year. The introduction of the pandemic into West Africa has changed the ball game and really disturbed smooth sailing into large scale seed production.”
The African Seed Trade Association, the continental mother association of seed sector actors, has called for concerted efforts to ensure quality and improved seeds reach farmers in a timely manner, despite the pandemic.
“The movement of seed within country and across borders should not be affected, considering that coronaviruses have poor survivability on surfaces, and it is highly improbable that coronaviruses can survive international transport,” Justin Rakotoarisaona, secretary general of the association, said in a statement copied to Alliance for Science. “This is especially true for shipments of seed handled by professional seed companies that already respect strict sanitary, phytosanitary and hygienic handling protocol.
“Closing borders or even slowing down the cross-border seed movement creates a significant problem in the seed supply chain domestically, regionally and globally,” Rakotoarisaona continued. “In a number of regions, it is now the planting season and timely delivery of seed and other agricultural inputs is crucial to ensure farmers plant on time in order to ensure food security, especially after the health crisis.”
Eric Danquah, professor and founding director of the West Africa Center for Crop Improvement at the University of Ghana, said COVID-19 has exposed weaknesses in the agricultural supply chain systems across the continent that need to be addressed immediately.
“It is troubling that commitment to the sector by governments has been waning, even as countries face some of the greatest threats in history, including population growth and the COVID-19 pandemic, which has disrupted food supply chains on an unprecedented scale,” he said. “Obviously, a business as usual approach will worsen the already troubling food and nutrition security situation. Whether the food system, especially in West Africa, emerges stronger or more fragile will depend on what is urgently done to create self-reliant food systems.”
Government officials on the continent are telling a different story and offering assurances that there is no need to panic.
“We have met with seed companies. They have assured us a lot of seeds are in country. It’s only the vegetables that we now have a bit of it coming in. But that is not a problem…,” Dr. Solomon Gyan Ansah, deputy director of agriculture at the Ministry of Food and Agriculture in Ghana, said.
“In fact, this pandemic has really prompted government [to recognize] that at any point in time, we should have some seeds that are secured to be used in times of disaster. And I believe government will put measures in place to make sure that we have seeds at all times to be used,” he added.
L’Académie africaine prospective a lancé sa plateforme prospective virtuelle du système alimentaire. C’est une série de séminaires en ligne auxquels ont participent plusieurs centaines de parties prenantes des organisations sous-régionales de recherche agricole, mettant en œuvre le programme CAADP XP4 financé par l’Union européenne, ainsi que d’autres organisations et individus des milieux universitaires, de la société civile et des agences non gouvernementales.
Dr Abdulrazak Ibrahim, Responsable du renforcement des capacités au FARA, et point focal de l’Académie africaine prospective, qui animait la séance d’ouverture de la toute première édition des séminaires en ligne de l’AFA, a inscrit le séminaire en ligne dans le contexte de l’approche du FARA en matière d’interventions, liées à la recherche agricole, face à la COVID-19 et a indiqué les trois étapes d’adaptation des technologies à l’atténuation des pénuries alimentaires, à l’accroissement des capacités de stockage, au renforcement des systèmes d’approvisionnement alimentaire, du commerce et des marchés de travail ainsi qu’à l’anticipation des vulnérabilités des systèmes alimentaires en Afrique.
L’Académie africaine prospective (AFA) est un réseau de praticiens de la prospective aux niveaux continental, sous-régional et national hébergé par le Forum pour la recherche agricole en Afrique. L’AFA contribue au renforcement des capacités en matière de prospective des professionnels travaillant dans les institutions africaines spécialisées dans l’AR4D et le secteur privé grâce à la sensibilisation, au renforcement des compétences pour mener des activités de prévision et interpréter les résultats prévisionnels, la fourniture d’une assistance technique pour permettre aux organisations régionales et nationales de participer aux activités de prospective et d’appliquer les résultats des études prospectives passées/en cours.
Le FARA a pour objectif de renforcer les mécanismes institutionnels et de promouvoir les activités prospectives sur le continent en collaboration avec le Forum mondial pour la recherche agricole (GFAR). L’approche adoptée par le FARA en matière de prospective vise à encourager une approche réactive des communautés confrontées à des changements en révélant les incertitudes et en les utilisant comme moyen d’action. La prospective agricole en Afrique a pour objectif de faciliter la capacité de réflexion prospective sur la manière dont l’innovation et les connaissances peuvent aider à surmonter les défis multiples auxquels fait face l’agriculture pour faire en sorte que la recherche et l’innovation agricoles répondent mieux aux exigences futures des systèmes agroalimentaires et de développement connexe.
La série de séminaires en ligne de l’AFA s’adresse aux praticiens qui veulent mieux comprendre l’impact de la COVID-19 sur les systèmes alimentaires (les praticiens et les parties prenantes de l’AR4D en Afrique y compris les décideurs, les chercheurs, les agents de vulgarisation, les acteurs du développement et les affiliés de l’AFA). Le séminaire participatif en ligne, qui se tient chaque semaine, est organisé par des spécialistes de la prospective et soutenu par des blogs et un groupe de discussion sur les sites Internet du FARA et du Foresight4Food.
The Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) has held its first Virtual Board Meeting which has been hugely successful as it has been a strong learning curve and a pointer to how future businesses of the organization may be conducted. The virtual Board meeting became unavoidable in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic and the impending need to meet our statutory governance obligations. Attendance was nearly 100% which we consider a huge success given the circumstance.
Opening the proceedings of the meeting, the acting Chairperson and DG of ISRA- Dr Alioune Fall expressed his profound commendations to the Executive Director and Management of FARA for defying the challenges posed by the global pandemic and its attendant constraints, and leveraging new media tools and technologies to make sure that board meeting took place, ensuring that the core business of the organization is not compromised in any way. He also indicated that this new way of conducting the primary tasks of the organization is worth emulating and encouraged the representatives of the sub-regional research organizations on the FARA Board to consider adopting and adapting the FARA approach to their own situations as well in these challenging times, while it is hoped that normal conditions of work will return in due course.
Following evolving smart online conferencing ethics, the format of the meeting was four-day virtual meetings structured after the normal physical space pattern, but not exceeding three hours of meeting per day and ensuring that absolutely nothing has been lost in the process. The committees on Programme, Finance and Administration, Nominations and Governance, as well as Audit and Risk Management, have all had their meetings normally with in-depth deliberations and engagements as it would have been conducted in the usual spirit.
The 26th Board also welcomed its newest member, Dr. Cliff Sibusiso Dlamini, the newly appointed Executive Director for the Centre for Coordination of Agriculture Research and Development for Southern Africa (CCARDESA). The appointment of Dr. Dlamini as head of the CCARDESA Secretariat took effect on 1st May 2020. Dr. Dlamini has an elaborate career path and holds a PhD in Forestry from the University of Stellenbosch. Besides his PhD, Dr. Dlamini holds five other degrees in various disciplines and is currently pursuing his 7th degree (M.Sc. in Sustainable Development) with the University of London.
Dr. Dlamini brings to the FARA Board a wealth of knowledge and many years of expansive research experience from the national, sub-regional and continental levels. Until his new appointment, Dr. Dlamini was the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Eswatini National Trust Commission where he guided the Trust in all areas and led the development of departmental strategic plans, the corporate strategic plan and its resource mobilization strategy.
