By: Ibenu Sharon (AFAAS), Bridget Kakuwa (CCARDESA), Benjamin Abugri (FARA)
14th August, Kampala – Uganda – With the overarching goal of fostering sustainable agricultural research transformation and rural development across Africa, the importance of strategic alliances and effective resource mobilization cannot be overstated. To this end, the CAADP-XP4 Consortium comprising the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA), the African Forum for Agricultural Advisory Services (AFAAS), the Association for Strengthening Agricultural Research in Eastern and Central Africa ( ASARECA), the Centre for Coordination of Agricultural Research and Development for Southern Africa (CCARDESA) and the West and Central African Council for Agricultural Research and Development (CORAF) organized a Comprehensive resource mobilization training in collaboration with the Food, Agriculture and Natural Resources Policy Analysis Network (FANRPAN) and the Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM) conducted an Intensive Resource Mobilization Training to equip stakeholders with the necessary skills and knowledge.
This training, conducted at the Fairway Hotel Kampala from 9th to 14th August 2023, aimed to address gaps in resource mobilization, crafting robust and sustainable fundraising strategies. Besides theoretical instruction, the training emphasized hands-on practice, targeting a diverse audience from Research and Extension institutions. The initiative focuses on fundamental principles, practical techniques, ethical considerations, and strategic evolution, hoping to revolutionize the way resources are mobilized.
Dr Aggrey Agumya, Executive Director of FARA
Dr. Aggrey Agumya, the Executive Director of FARA, highlighted the timeliness of this initiative, emphasizing the growing financial challenges faced by AR4D research organizations. He spotlighted the shrinking resources and increasing dependencies, urging the need for more innovative funding solutions, especially given the pandemic’s financial impact and changing donor priorities. Dr Agumya further intimated that Funders are showing a preference for interventions that yield tangible results in a short time, which has further put the supra-national AR4D organizations at a disadvantage because their results/outcomes are not readily tangible, and they are medium to long-term. “Under these circumstances, it is essential that these organizations and the national partners they support are compelled to find innovative ways of mobilizing resources and build the required capacities”, emphasized Dr Agumya.
Echoing this sentiment, Mr Max Olupot, the Director of Programmes from AFAAS, recognized Dr. Agumya’s leadership ascent and underscored the urgency of resource mobilization for the consortium’s continuity. He further noted that this period was critical for the CAADPXP4 Consortium as the CAADP-XP4 program is coming to an end and hence need to solicit more funds so that there is continuity and sustainability.
Dr Baisti Podisi, the CAADP-XP4 Coordinator from CCARDESA, indicated that the meeting was a progression of CCARDESA’s existing initiatives. “This meeting will help us build more partnerships, and Agroecology is a niche topic that all of us in the room could ride and benefit from. It is critical as SROs to catalyze our institutions to support our countries’ access to funding. We need to be more innovative in engaging the private partnership.” Re-echoed, Dr Podisi.
Ms Julian Barungi speaking on behalf of the ASARECA Executive Director emphasized their unwavering commitment to the consortium’s partnerships.
The Resource Mobilization training unfolded in two distinct phases, with the virtual Training, spanning five days; this phase deep-dived into resource mobilization, encompassing an array of topics, from fundraising strategies and the moral aspects of resource mobilization to monitoring, evaluation, and best practices.
Participants go through developing a problem tree for their projects during the physical training in Kampala-Uganda
Whereas the practical application and second segment focused on drafting effective proposals. It was tailored to address currently active calls for proposals, leveraging themes from the Horizon Europe Working Programme and the EC-INTPA calls.
This endeavour by the CAADP-XP4 Consortium epitomizes hope for Africa’s sustainable agricultural evolution. It not only arms stakeholders with indispensable skills but also signifies the transformative power of unity and strategic collaborations in reshaping Africa’s agricultural horizon.
In a bid to reinforce the African Union’s comprehensive commitment to agricultural development in Africa, the first-ever meeting since the formation of the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) Communication and Knowledge Management Thematic Working Group took place at the Movenpick Hotel, Nairobi, from 3-4 August.
Some Participants at the AU CAADP KM & Comms Workshop
The main objective of the meeting was to propel the CAADP agenda forward through meticulous communication, advocacy, and knowledge management. The meeting also aimed to assess the strides made, design a concrete work plan, and establish a coordinated mechanism to bolster CAADP and forge a coordination blueprint for the CAADP Communication group following recommendations from Yaounde’s engagement, from 1-5 August 2022.
The desired outcomes of this coordination meeting were manifold, from highlighting the progress made in communication, knowledge management and advocacy at all levels to defining coordination tools for the CAADP Communication group. This will help improve awareness of the CAADP Malabo declaration, and support the implementation of the CAADP Business Plan 2022-2025 and the Jointly developed CAADP work plan.
Ms Panduleni Elago – Senior CAADP Advisor – African Union Commission
The meeting was officially opened by Ms Panduleni Elago, the CAADP Advisor, who emphasized the African Union’s anticipation towards the thematic working group to expedite the AU agenda. “The AU looks forward to the Key Performance Indicators that will emerge from this group that will address the knowledge and information gap in the Biannual Review Process,”.
Ms Peace Mutuwa the Communication and Knowledge Management expert, echoing the sentiments of the African Union Commission (AUC), emphasized how pivotal this group would be in propelling the AU’s goals forward. “As we commence this mammoth task, we need to develop Terms of Reference (TORs) that will govern our modus operandi. We should also not forget the critical role of the media in disseminating information to the communities on the CAADP process.
A palpable sense of duty settled in the room as the discussions pivoted to the 4th Biannual Review (4BR) of the CAADP. Two decades after the inception of Malabo, a gap remains; farmers are still in the dark about its potential. The need of the hour is curating content specifically tailored for small-scale farmers, ensuring it’s digestible and beneficial.
The African Union envisions this esteemed assembly to be the foundation of a robust CAADP Communication strategy. Policy LINK, a global Feed the Future program to advance leadership and collaboration for better policy systems implemented by DAI and working with the AUC, voiced the importance of technical and financial backing. They stressed, “It’s time we lay down tangible recommendations, lighting our path forward.”
CCARDESA, through its Information, Communication, and Knowledge Management Officer, Mrs Bridget Kakuwa-Kasongamulilo, joined the chorus, recognizing the CAADP as Africa’s agricultural cornerstone, she urged the assembly to prioritize the seven commitments, though it demands perseverance.
Mr Benjamin Abugri, FARA’s Knowledge Management and Communication Cluster Lead, urged the Working Group to be forward-thinking in using existing knowledge services and tools such as the FARA Africa Community (Dgroups) to discuss BR processes as they also act as interactive tools that allow information exchange and knowledge co-creation.
The meeting’s purpose shone clear: addressing the gaping communication void, ensuring synchronization with technical processes, advocating for CAADP, and strategizing its communication. The dialogue flowed, touching upon the support communications provided to the Biannual Review reporting and the Malabo. The ensemble also considered the potential of leveraging annual events like the CAADP Meetings, the AASW, the KM4AgD Conference, the Fertiliser Summit, and others, ensuring these platforms spread the right message.
Delving deep into recommendations from the Critical BR Analysis Report, the group proposed developing a protocol for the Biannual Review mechanism and a review of the toolkit for communication and knowledge management.
In attendance were participants from AUC, AUDA-NEPAD, AU-IASPC, RECs, Policy Link, FAO, ILRI, TASAI, CCARDESA, FARA, AU-IBAR, and other esteemed organizations. With two days of productive discourse, this meeting in Nairobi, from 3-4 August 2023, was not just a gathering, but a revolution in the making.
Much has been made about the potential of Africa’s ambitious free trade agreement to boost economic growth, with a recent International Monetary Fund (IMF) study suggesting it could increase the flow of goods within the continent by more than 50%.
Given that agriculture alone generates more than a third of Africa’s GDP, food systems will be key to the success of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), providing immediate benefits from a dominant sector across all signatories.
The AfCFTA was agreed in May 2019 and took effect in January 2021. Since then, progress towards full ratification has stalled amid ongoing negotiations over customs, tariffs and competition rules. But with the agri-food sector representing both common ground and a primary industry across the continent, agriculture should be prioritised as a test case for AfCFTA adoption to spur not only economic growth and trade but also food security and better livelihoods premised on greater climate resilience.
As the African Union sets out to accelerate AfCFTA’s implementation this year, it is critical that Africa also embraces a new era of agricultural innovation that is pragmatic, collaborative, and consistent to deliver on the promise of the agreement to create one African market. Innovation that drives policy and productivity could help set a precedent for other sectors while simultaneously tackling the more immediate challenges, including hunger, malnutrition and poverty.
Vital to leveraging agricultural research and innovation to drive forward intra-African agri-food trade is closer collaboration between the public and private sectors. The Eighth Africa Agribusiness and Science Week, taking place June 5-8 in Durban, South Africa, provides a timely opportunity to unite agri-food research and industry.
Action plan for agricultural innovation
And leading this charge are our two organisations – the continent’s apex agricultural research and coordination organisation, the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA), and CGIAR, the world’s largest publicly funded agri-foods-focused partnership.
Together with the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the African Union Commission (AUC), FARA and CGIAR have committed to a shared action plan for agricultural innovation over the coming years. This plan is based on common principles defined in the Abidjan II agreement that puts the interests of African food security, development and economic growth at its heart.
Firstly, unlocking innovation to increase agri-food production and trade sustainably will rely on demand-driven research and development that responds to African smallholder farmers’ specific needs and challenges.
An estimated 65% of the world’s remaining uncultivated arable land is in sub-Saharan Africa, yet the region produces only 10% of global agricultural output. New technologies, services and good agricultural practices (GAP) must therefore address the unique factors that determine African productivity, including the disproportionate impacts of climate change and the increasingly young population.
African agriculture needs innovation that accounts for the fact that 65% of land is considered degraded, up to half of its harvest is lost to pests and other environmental challenges, and by 2030, almost 120m people will have to contend with drought, floods, and extreme heat. To shore up the impending productivity shortfalls, agricultural innovation in the years ahead will be led by African priorities and expertise, developed according to global best practices, to reinforce the foundations of a competitive and dynamic sector. Secondly, both existing and emerging innovations must reach enough farmers to be adopted at scale to make a meaningful difference to the continent’s food systems.Transforming and sustaining African food, land and water systems is a complex challenge that requires different stakeholders working together, using spaces for them to share their knowledge, expertise and experiences.
This is why our organisations are working together with others to help streamline funding, infrastructure and the last-mile delivery of breakthroughs to transform African agriculture. Equipping farmers with the latest science and innovation will fulfil not only AfCFTA but the broader goals of Agenda 2063, including the core values enshrined in its Comprehensive African Agricultural Development Programme (CAADP).
This collaboration is already under way, with the second phase of the AfDB’s flagship Technologies for African Agricultural Transformation (TAAT) initiative recently receiving an additional $27m in funding. TAAT, led and implemented by CGIAR with partners, aims to double productivity across African agriculture by making proven technologies available to more than 40m producers by 2025.
Collobaration is key
Finally, closer alignment between like-minded organisations makes us greater than the sum of our parts and offers governments and donors consolidated returns on investment.
CGIAR’s global network of a dozen world-class research centres and myriad partners can complement, equip, and strengthen African institutions, offering learnings from elsewhere in the Global South to maximise the likelihood and pace of success. In turn, African institutions continue to drive the operationalisation of the CAADP Malabo commitments, ensuring African challenges and opportunities are met with African solutions that are effective and sustainable.
With a renewed agenda for innovation and a united front across the key players at global and continental levels, agricultural development can underpin the fulfilment of AfCFTA. In doing so, together, we can deliver improved livelihoods, incomes and economic growth as well as food security, nutrition, and greater equality – an ambition we can all get behind.
Dr Yemi Akinbamijo
Dr Yemi Akinbamijo is executive director of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA).
Dr Claudia Sadoff
Dr Claudia Sadoff is executive managing director, CGIAR.
The leadership of FARA and CCARDESA led by Ms Bongiwe Njobe, a FARA Board member, Dr Yemi Akinbamijo (FARA Executive Director), Prof. Cliff Dlamini (Executive Director of CCARDESA), in the company of Mr Simon Mukeze (CCARDESA Finance Manager), held a meeting with Honorable Jabulani Mabuza, Minister of Agriculture, Kingdom of Eswatini on the state of preparedness of the Eighth African Agribusiness and Science Week (AASW8) which has been planned to take place in Durban during the week of June 5, 2023.
The AASW is the foremost continental platform of all African stakeholders involved in agriculture and agribusiness research and innovation. The forum assembles over 1,500 stakeholders to take stock of progress on research and innovation, share information, network, create business alliances, and map out priorities for joint action. The 8th edition of the AASW will be held in Durban, South Africa, from June 5 to 8, 2023. It will focus on a topical issue on the Continent, including strengthening linkages between agribusiness and science and innovation to improve its productivity and competitiveness in the agro-industry.
The meeting secured the commitment of the Honourable Minister of Agriculture of Eswatini, the vivid engagement of the agriculture private sector practitioners, and the science community of Eswatini towards the Durban meeting. The Minister expressed his appreciation and optimism that the AASW will help strengthen and stimulate engagements of relevant stakeholders for accelerating the continent’s agricultural productivity, particularly for the Kingdom of Eswatini.
From left: Dr Yemi Akinbamijo, Hon Jabulani Mabuza, Ms Bongiwe Njobe, Mr Simon Mukeze & Prof. Cliff Dlamini
The meeting also created opportunities for greater collaboration between the stakeholders of the Kingdom of Eswatini and Agriculture Research for Development (ARD) institutions. Both parties expressed optimism that this collaboration would positively change the efforts to strengthen research, business, and policy linkages and achieve better outcomes for Africa’s agricultural sector.
The year 2023 started on a high note for all African food and nutrition security visionaries and all well-meaning supporters of the Feed Africa initiative. They heeded the call of the President of the African Development Bank to converge at the Feed Africa Summit dubbed Dakar 2 under the high patronage of the President of the Republic of Senegal H. E President Macky Sall who, apart from being the president of the African Union for the waning year, very aptly has the theme for the Union hinged on Food and Nutrition Security for 2022/23. In its own class, it would be the second high-level forum on the African food question. This is a perennial going concern for Africa because of the pivotal role of Sustainable Development Goal #2 and the domino effect it has on the realization of the remaining 16 SDGS.
With only eight years to 2030, there seems to be no time to lose, and the urgency could not have been stronger than what played out in Dakar from the 25th to the 27th of January where 34 heads of state and governments on the continent came together to deal decisively with the African food issue like never before. Bring the political clout of the Government of Senegal (and the Chairperson of the African Union) and the magnum force of the AfDB and its charismatic President Adesina whose burning passion is ‘Feed Africa!’ and the grand slam political will of the African Union, and what you get is the resultant shifts in the tectonic plates of Africa’s food insecurity becoming insecure, as they begin to quake and rumble as it happened in Dakar 2. So, the rumblings did begin in Dakar for the final onslaught.
The Dakar 2 event came rushing like an avalanche of energies unleashed at injury time for a trophy that must be won or lost now or never. At the last count with supercharged 72 hours, some 2000 humans were all it has taken to shift this needle. Dakar 2 was the cauldron of Africa’s best. If there was a time when all the forces were aligned in favour of the much talked about agricultural transformation in Africa, it would be the Dakar 2 Summit. In sympathy with the call for transformation in Africa’s agriculture, the emerging Dakar megalopolis-in-transition hosted the strongest defining moment of the continent’s agriculture. Last year was encumbered with very high-level discussions on the implications of the CGIAR reform exercise and how Africa should be optimally positioned in a way that confers a win-win scenario for all parties. It does present as if all the instruments are tuned and set for the grand command performance in the African agricultural domain. It will be difficult not to see tangible progress given the alignment of forces and the impetus provided by Dakar 2.
All the development partners and global leaders were on deck prodding Africa to victory over food insecurity. Of honorable mention is the presence of the President Michael D Higgins of Ireland and his wife. His compelling love for the continent was evident from his gusto in his voice, defying the burden of age speaking passionately from his heart on why no one in Africa ought to feel hunger. The consensus was that it was time for Africans to feed Africa. The convergence of the constellation was too strong to be ignored. We do so at our peril. The congregation in Dakar was deliberate coming after the 2015 meeting in the same venue in Dakar. It was akin to a musical ensemble in the finest mastery of their scores. Then Dakar 2 closed with the promise of a new horizon for Africa. We have found the right track and the leadership skillset at last. We had an unprecedented forty-one Compacts that are intentional on what, where, who, when, and how. The score is clear enough on the melody, let us now go ahead with the harmony. That was the message – as clear as a bell.
In what seemed like a monumental showdown, the much-talked-about Dakar 2 Summit all too soon is done and dusted. it was no mean feat galvanizing these 34 heads of state the African Union, the one CGIAR, etc, to have this three-day discourse on getting the African food question sorted. There was the goodwill and the good wind in the sail; Africa must now take to the sea. The new players – SAPZ, CAAPs, One CGIAR, XP4 fraternity, 41 Compacts and associated stakeholders/investors all fully geared and engaged. This wave needs to be sustained as we cannot continue to celebrate ripples when what we need is a tsunami and all holds must be unbarred for Africa to be truly unleashed. Earning the promise will be a function of our ability to carry through the vision.
The stage was fully propped and set at the CICAD Diaminiado on the outskirts of the iconic city of Dakar now bursting at the seams. Dakar 2 was hosted at the CICAD tucked away from the hustles and bustles of the Dakar-Sally highway. Indeed, success is never by default. It must be intentional – a piece at a time, a building at a time, one by one, line by line; playing it by the script. A new Dakar is emerging with modern infrastructure. A sheer demonstration of the unflinching commitment to development with a pristine master plan without the all too familiar innuendos and obfuscations of many-a-model of failed attempts at national transformation. It was all in empathy with its physical infrastructural development and Dakar has again played host to Africa’s food conundrum – the stomach infrastructure question. It happened in the very place where it all began with the first episode of the first summit that was held in 2015. Dakar 1 was an intentional convening of the forces that must shift Africa’s food and nutrition security needle. Aptly put, Dakar I was the turning of the sod for Africa’s agricultural transformation. It took a colossal momentum to break the political administrative and social frictions that held Africa bound in needless poverty and penury.
The outcome is that the goodness of the TAAT (Technologies for African Agricultural Transformation) is there for us to see. African agricultural transformation shifted a lot of stuff from the shelf to the market so through the instrumentation of the science fraternities of Africa’s national agricultural research systems, the sub-regional organizations, the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa and the CGIAR.
Going Forward – new kids on the blocks
The progress will be in the policies, practices and processes that follow Dakar 2. Between the promise and the future position is the process. Otherwise, where we stopped would be the same as where we started – going in circles. The cock must crow; thereafter it will walk away. Let him that is asleep respond to the cock.
The burgeoning question defying every wit was not ‘how did we get here’ but ‘what is keeping us there’? All the leaders alluded to a parody of the African misery of want in the midst of plenty! Indeed, no one eats potentials! The strongest signal in recent memories is that the leadership of Africa is taking the food question very seriously and confronting this monster head-to-head, foot-to-foot. One of the strongest indications in recent times that portends Africa’s dogged effort towards the attainment of food security sovereignty closed in the iconic city of Dakar, Senegal. It was the gathering of the Titans. It should not be rocket science to fix the persistent emptiness of Africa’s kitchens. The ingredients are all complete and not in short supply the broth therefore must be delicious if the skill of the chef is good. We had the ubiquitous political wills, the development partners and donor representatives, science fraternities, enablers and financial institutions, and civil societies.
Following the second Abidjan high-level session, a Communique has been elaborated and fully endorsed for implementation by the four principals. That in itself is good progress, and we are grateful for the guidance provided at every stage by the principals. The fulfillment of the promise of Dakar 2 would be contingent on various ancillary factors. These factors have also taken on their own life emerging nicely by the script. First off, Marco Ferroni the erstwhile Chair of the CGIAR System Board had done a great job of maneuvering the not-so-easy institutional retooling of the CGIAR. It was not the fanciest task with so many push and pull and a host of moving parts all competing for attention at the same time. As of January 2023, the transition in the leadership of the CGIAR was concluded. Lindiwe Majele Sibanda would become the first African and first female to hold the reins of the largest public-funded Agricultural Science body in the world. As an African, the pressure is also on the Zimbabwe-born Sibanda to take the global body to its next level. There is no doubt that she will perform pristinely as she did in her former capacity as the Board Chair of the International Livestock Research Institute. She joins Claudia Sadoff (Executive Managing Director -One CGIAR) and a host of other globally recognized scientists in their own rights in the System Leadership Team. The strongest impulse for me has been the appointment of three African Directors General Designate for the three One-CGIAR institutions in Africa. These are Dr. Simeon Ehui (Ivory Coast), Boubacar Maneh (The Gambia) and Professor Appolinaire Djikeng (Cameroon) for IITA, Africa Rice and ILRI respectively. In line with the reform of the One CGIAR, these new appointees will also dual hat with other functions in resonance with the demands of the reform. We wish them Godspeed and good health in the delivery of their respective mandates. Africa must now feed Africans!
The science behind Africa’s agriculture
With the much-talked-about one CG reform and how it would play out in Africa, the principals have pronounced themselves in the communique but were published late last year in which the African Union Commission the African Development Bank the CGIAR and the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) committed to core values and principles of the reform. Of significance is the Action Plan that is now being elaborated by the CGIAR and FARA.
The progress in the process has been commendable. Nothing would be of greater help to the accomplishment of the communique than the outcomes of the Dakar 2 summit. Although they had evolved independently, the much-desired synergy of purpose is only akin to the harmonic embellishments between the CGIAR initiative and the Feed Africa summit being well played. Of course, when the elephant dies all kinds of knives will emerge. Given the progress made on the CGIAR front, it was most reassuring to hear the refreshing vision of the new leadership of the CGIAR. Lindiwe Sibanda, Claudia Sadoff, and the full complement of the Directors General designate for IITA, Africa Rice and ILRI, the board chair of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa Director General of IITA, and more bear testimony to the magnitude of seriousness with which Africa is matching its food needs. The trio of Dr. Ehui, Mane, and Professor Djikeng is one of the best things that has happened to African Agriculture in recent times. The onus is now on Africans leading Africa for Africa to feed Africa. This intrinsically puts Africans in charge of their own destiny for the first time in the feed Africa agenda of the African Development Bank and these alignments could not have been more instructive.
In Dakar, when Africa came home to its town hall meeting, it made the biggest, brightest, and boldest move towards breaking the food conundrum of Africa -the son of the soil, nay the son of the Nile is thirsty! (Ethiopian proverb).Africa came to a monumental watershed in Dakar with an unprecedented gathering of the leaders of the continent with the support of the development partners finally taking the definitive step. If this convergence of forces will not nail it, I wouldn’t know what else will.
The leaders did not have to do it but they did it all the same and they all demonstrated their solid inner cores by burning the midnight oil so that Africa can sleep easily. Voices with a vision I crouched and cringed as Adesina belched out his compelling modicum. According to him, truly the neck of the African baby has been misaligned for ages. it has become the new normal but somewhat, the moment has arrived when all of a sudden, we are re-writing the narrative and righting the wrongs.
Dakar 2 gave the needed impetus for the home run. For the first time, Africa seems poised from all angles to give the final push to the birth of a food-secure Africa.
The tale of the two Compacts
The agricultural landscape is not new to the use of ‘Compacts’ as a register. Contrasting with the very well-known (defunct)CAADP Compacts, the word has been used interchangeably to mean different things to different people at different times. Within the context of Dakar 2, the word Compact deployed a unique appeal. It was the concerted conversation around the clear road map towards the food sovereignty of a particular nation. The choice of commodities was intentional. The means to the end were also clear. It was the promise of a process whose fulfillment would entail the engagement of a multiplicity of actors and partners. One of the defining miens of the compacts was that they were convened in a business-like fashion in forums dubbed the Boardroom chaired by the Heads of state. It was gladdening to see President Macky Sall and his team ironing out the details of the Senegalese Compact like many others.
Engaging the process after the promise is the swim or sink litmus test of the gravitas of Dakar 2. We are all awaiting what will happen in the coming days. Ahead of the 36th Ordinary Summit of the African Union Summit of Heads of State and Governments, there will be the CAAPs Roundtable. It is interesting to note that in addition to the SAPZ, the CAAPs have been referenced by some compacts.
Leadership Calls and Quotes
I consider it a shame that after 60 years of Africa’s independence, the leaders of the continent are gathered again to discuss food insufficiency said H. E William Ruto, the President of the Republic of Kenya.
Give us this day Our Daily Bread is the strongest indication of food and nutritional security in the exhortation of the President of Madagascar
To continue to fantasize about Africa’s wealth and natural resources is akin to drinking soup with a fork –Jeanine Millie Cooper (Minister of Agriculture, Government of Liberia)
No man is worth greater accolade than he who is unblocking African food pipes.
My tail piece and the unpalatable oxymorons
For more than 60 years, that is for as long as I have been alive, Africa has begged for food starting with the US aid dried milk (Pau) that I grew up on in 1965.Today as a grandfather and lead advocate for agricultural research and development on the continent, the situation has not shifted because Africa is still begging for food and more. You can say that ‘something’ was wrong; and we can talk about fixing the ‘something’. But the truth is there had been nothing (no ‘something’) to fix during these past decades!
I wondered how I had dreams after my graduation as one of 120 conferred with a Bachelor of Agriculture degree in 1984 for food and nutrition secure and food self-sufficient Africa. That is now a mirage in retrospect. We need to fix these flaws before the kids wake up although they are already awake. And like a part of a scene poorly written in which we must all now play – the tacit comedy of errors.
It is not wrong to be lost. We all do get lost once in a while. But to have been lost and left without a robust game plan for getting back on track is not just a social or political disaster, it is a social suicide. For now, we do know that it was the other side of the food question coin that got sorted in Dakar. With the new blood infused in the leadership of the Science institutions, the stage seems set with zero tolerance for failure. Let’s do this together, Let us Feed Africa!
Dr. Yemi Akinbamijo
Executive Director of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA)
Discussions on foresight for food systems have never been more critical than they are today. This became more evident when a team of officials from FARA (Wole Fatunbi, Abdulrazak Ibrahim, Kwaku Antwi, Karen Musikoyo-Nguru), CCARDESA (Baitsi Podisi), and AFAAS (Samson Eshetu, Martin Sekeleti, Frances Nakakawa, Gifty Narh Guiella, Nkiru Meludu, and Dele Tologbonse) attended a 4-day workshop at the University of Oxford. The workshop was facilitated by experts from the University of Oxford (Jim Woodhill, John Ingram, Monika Zurek) and Wageningen University and Research (Herman Brouwer and Just Dengerink). The workshop which took place from the 5th to the 8th of July 2022 highlighted the importance of applying foresight techniques for policy decisions, especially in the global food system. Africa, being on the margins of integration through the continental free trade agreement, should ensure that smallholder farmers are well positioned to benefit from the USD 1 trillion Agriculture and agribusiness market in Africa that was predicted by the World Bank (AFDB, 2019).
Given the number of growing challenges and competing priorities, we are also experiencing complexity, volatility, and ambiguity. More specifically, increased urbanization has caused rising demand for more varied and sophisticated foods, which presents an opportunity for policymakers, regulators, researchers, and the private sector to work together in establishing sustainable food systems. Perhaps, this is an opportune time to address the unpredictability of the future and the pace of change as we have it today due to the increase in digital technology. Therefore, I believe that strengthening our capacities to meet different demands in our various roles and gain the ability to think and decide more holistically is critical in the food systems transition. In this case, institutions that think ahead and plan better will be better prepared to take advantage of the opportunities that rapid social and technological progress is creating.
During the four-day foresight workshop, the team undertook an exercise of scanning whereby a thorough discussion led to the identification of climate change as a significant issue that affects food production and circulation. The team then carried out an analysis of the trends in Africa’s food system. The trend analysis, in this case, examined the nature, causes, rate of development, and impacts of climate change on the food system. Scenario development and analysis were explored whereby future possibilities were discussed. Ideally, a scenario should show various plausible ways that the future might unfold. As such, several scenarios could be developed to support decision-making processes as well as for planning purposes.
Here is an example of scenarios generated in a foresight activity carried out by FARA and key stakeholders in Malawi. The activity analyzed the interactions and emerging effects of the transition of the tobacco value chain in Malawi and the likely policy responses to those effects.
Given that foresight is generally the act of looking to and thinking about the future, the CAADP XP4 consortium and its partners have recognized that foresight is a necessary skill in Africa’s AR4D. Mainly because foresight techniques help in,
Planning and supporting institutions to be more proactive especially in addressing emerging issues.
Policy alignment and sound decision-making. This is especially if multi-disciplinary and multi-stakeholder teams are involved in the process.
Strengthening the capacity of multi-stakeholder platforms to collaborate and prioritize and develop more sustainable interventions for Agriculture transformation.
Going forward, it was agreed that collaboration between Foresight4Food, which is pioneered by the University of Oxford, and Africa Foresight Academy, which is hosted by FARA, will carry out foresight activities for sustainable and inclusive food systems. This will involve carrying out horizon scanning, trend analysis, and scenario mapping. Further awareness must be created at the policy level and with different stakeholders. In addition, capacity-building efforts will be geared towards developing foresight capabilities as well as establishing a foresight community of practice.
