Tri-lateral Partnership US-Kenya-India addresses African Food Security

Alexander Kahi (seated), dean at Egerton University, signs a document related to the new tri-lateral agreement. From the left is B. Bebe, Egerton faculty member; Mark Erbaugh of Ohio State, and Gusharan Singh, of India's Punjab Agricultural University.

Jan 10, 2013. The U.S./India/Africa Tri-lateral University Partnership Program for Food Security will combine the strengths of PAU with Ohio State's expertise in agricultural capacity-building to address poverty and hunger issues in Kenya and throughout Africa.

The program is a joint effort of the U.S. government and the government of India. It is run under the auspices of the U.S.-India Strategic Dialogue by the U.S. Agency for International Development and the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Foreign Agricultural Service.

The tri-lateral project was one of just two funded by the U.S. government. The other is a partnership between Michigan State University, Tamil Nadu Veterinary and Animal Sciences University in India, and the Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources in Malawi.

U.S.-Africa Agribusiness Investment Forum

November 12-14, 2012. Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. U.S.-Africa Agribusiness Investment Forum: Private Sector Opportunities in Support of Inclusive Agricultural Growth. The Corporate Council on Africa hosted the 2012 U.S.-Africa Agribusiness Investment Forum in Ethiopia to introduce the U.S.-Africa Business Center (USABC) and its role in facilitating U.S.-African trade and highlight other initiatives designed to boost agricultural growth, trade and investment.

Attended by a number of industry members drawn from the USA, Canada, Nigeria, Uganda, South Africa, Tanzania, Kenya Swaziland, Zimbabwe and Burkina Faso as well as Ethiopia, the conference brought together U.S. and African businesses, investors and financiers, policy makers, representatives of the public sector, capital market experts and service providers. They were able to discuss various cross-cutting issues, including finance, risk mitigation, value-chain development, and industry best practices and trends. The forum was also intended to introduce the U.S.-Africa Business Center and its role in facilitating U.S.-African trade as well as highlight other initiatives designed to boost agricultural growth, trade and investment.
One of the speakers at the Workshop 4: Fork: Opportunities at the End of the Value Chain was Lucy Muchoki, Chief Executive Officer, Pan African Agribusiness and Agro Industry Consortium.

Mark Carrato, Foreign Service- Private Enterprise at USAID  noted the ineffectiveness of the donor support approach and praised the growing focus on public-private partnership as a significant step forward.

Workshop 7 addressed The Role of Regional Economic Communities in Facilitating Agricultural Trade and Investment. The EAC is developing a partnership with the United States that is being designed to increase investment and trade, and private sector participation will be critical to its success.

Related:
25-28 November 2012 - Dakar, Senegal. FARA and UniBRAIN host a side event at the AgriBusiness Forum 2012: 6 UniBRAIN incubees to present their projects!

UniBRAIN is an initiative of the Forum of Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) and the government of Denmark whose objective is to enable universities, business and agricultural research institutions to commercialise agricultural technologies and produce graduates with entrepreneurial and business skills.

"Africa is blessed with the world’s youngest population but if the youth are not gainfully employed they will become frustrated, angry and dangerous. This must be avoided by creating jobs and for that it is necessary to have job-creators, in other words successful entrepreneurs and business men and women", explains Ralph von Kaufmann, FARA's Facility Coordinator. 

Read Ralph von Kaufmann's full interview here:

Promoting Responsible Agricultural Investments in Africa

October 22, 2012. Washington, D.C. Increased interest in public and private investments in the African agricultural sector has raised concern over how such investments will benefit smallholder farmers.

This discussion explored how best to develop “responsible investments” that are profitable for international private investors as well as for local farmers, businesses and governments. As part of a series of conversations that the Partnership to Cut Hunger and Poverty in Africa has launched in the U.S. and Africa, the event helped define and identify appropriate models that promote responsible investments in Africa.

Go straight to the second panel @ 1h18 minutes
Moderator – Mima Nedelcovych, Partner, Schaffer Global Group
• Promoting Inclusive Agricultural Investments That Benefit Smallholder Farmers
– Katie Campbell, Senior Policy Analyst, ActionAid
• Forging Effective Public-Private Partnerships to Facilitate Responsible Agricultural
Investments
– Matthew Armah, COO, Millennium Development Authority, Ghana
• Making New Private Sector Investments Work for African Agriculture
– Njack Kane, CEO, Novel Commodities, Geneva
• Encouraging Responsible Private Sector Investments in the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition
– Paul Weisenfeld, Assistant to the Administrator, Bureau for Food Security, USAID

 

First Meeting of Agricultural Chief Scientists (MACS) of G20 countries

24th to 27th September 2012. Guadalajara. Mexico. This meeting wa convened by the Mexican government as part of their role heading the Group of Twenty (G-20) this year.

The objectives of the first MACS were to:

• inform stakeholders of existing global resources, programs and collaborative efforts for agricultural research that can help address food security challenges; 
• identify, strengthen and compliment research priority areas for collective action in coherence with existing initiatives to sustainably intensify agricultural production, in order to meet increased and changing demand for healthy, safe and nutritious food whilst mitigating and adapting to climate change; 
• identify avenues to better coordinate resources and existing initiatives in support of these priorities; 
• establish baselines and track progress toward collective commitments and priorities; and 



Dr. Catherine Woteki, USDA Chief Scientist 

and Under Secretary for Research, 

Education, and Economics

• facilitate new partnerships on collaborative research in agriculture and food security

Prof. Jones (FARA) and Dr.Catherine Woteki (U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) delivered the key scene-setting presentations on establishing global agricultural research and development (AR&D) priorities. 

The meeting deliberated on establishing MACS Global Research Collaboration Platforms (GRCPs) to promote global collective action involving national agricultural research for development strategies and capacities of the G20 countries. Four initial GRCPs were presented, including: 

1. Access to scholarly publications and other technical documentation; 
2. Access to germplasm collections and related information, as per international treaties to which countries are members, and in accordance with national legislation; 
3. Access to genetic and genomic data, and establishment of public databases for agricultural research and development projects; and 
4. Improving agricultural innovation (extension service and technology transfer) and agricultural statistics systems (information communication technology and market data).

The Tropical Agriculture Platform (TAP), a G20 commitment in 2011, was formally launched by FAO. This platform aims to achieve greater coherence of capacity development and knowledge sharing for agriculture innovation to improve production and productivity in the tropics, with a particular focus on smallholders, under a multilateral and multi-sectorial approach.

The meeting reviewed the status and progress of Global Research Initiatives endorsed by the G20 and ongoing collaborative mechanisms including the CGIAR Research Programmes (CRPs) on Wheat, Maize, Rice and Livestock and Fish, as well as the Global Research Alliance on Agricultural Greenhouse Gases. The Global Access to Technology for Development Foundation, the Syngenta Foundation for Sustainable Agriculture, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation presented programs for Public-Private Partnerships, across the entire value chain of agricultural products, as mechanisms to accelerate global agricultural innovation. 

The next meeting will be scheduled by the next President of the G20 (Russia).

Related blog post:

23/06/2012. G20 Mexico 2012 launched an innovative Fund to Boost Food Security and Farmer Livelihoods

EXPANSION AND PROGRESS OF THE NEW ALLIANCE FOR FOOD SECURITY AND NUTRITION

September 26, 2012. The United States Government, along with other G8 members, hosted a side event at the United Nations General Assembly in New York to announce that Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire and Mozambique have joined the G8’s New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition.

In addition, USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah announced that 21 additional private sector companies, most of them African companies, have signed letters of intent, committing themselves to invest an additional $500 million in African agriculture.

Related: Africa Faces Food Insecurity, Slowing Development, Ministers Warn UN General AssemblyA range of African ministers took to the podium of the United Nations General Assembly to highlight the precarious situation arising from food insecurity and the slow-down in development due to the global economic crisis.The African ministers were among scores of world leaders and other high-level officials presenting their views and comments on issues of individual national and international relevance at the Assembly's General Debate, which ended on 1 October.

   

Related:
In this Feed the Future video, narrator Matt Damon discusses efforts to turn the tide against global hunger and increase agricultural production around the world. The video was shown at the "Feed the Future: Partnering With Civil Society" event, held in New York on September 27, 2012. Feed the Future is the U.S. global hunger and food security initiative; learn more at http://www.feedthefuture.gov. [Go to http://www.state.gov/video for more video and text transcript.]

The Future Of Food at the Clinton Global Initiative

23-25 September. New York City. Clinton Global Initiative (CGI). Established in 2005 by President Bill Clinton, CGI convenes a community of global leaders to forge solutions to the world’s most pressing challenges. CGI Annual Meetings have brought together more than 150 heads of state, 20 Nobel Prize laureates, and hundreds of leading CEOs, heads of foundations and NGOs, major philanthropists, and members of the media.

The Future Of Food

Moderator:
Judith Rodin, President, The Rockefeller Foundation

Participants:

• Akinwumi Adesina, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Federal Republic of Nigeria
• Jason Clay, Senior Vice President, Market Transformation, World Wildlife Fund
• Clarence Otis, Jr., Chairman and CEO, Darden Restaurants, Inc
• Irene B. Rosenfeld, Chairman and CEO, Kraft Foods, Inc.

The Role of Food Processing in Creating Markets and Reducing Losses for Smallholder Farmers in Africa

Michele McNabb, President, 

Partnership to Cut Hunger & 

Poverty in Africa

September 7, 2012. Washington, DC. The goal of this symposium was to highlight examples of how food processing can create markets for smallholder farmers and entrepreneurs, reduce food losses, improve nutrition, and meet changing food demand. The discussion will also focus on how public, private and civil sector organizations can facilitate the required innovative food technologies, business expertise and policy environment in Africa.

PANEL: Leveraging Appropriate Innovations for Food Processing and Market Development for Smallholder Farmers

1. Linking Farmers to Markets through Food Processing and Value Addition: Case studies from West Africa – Betty Bugusu, Managing Director, Purdue University’s International Food Technology Center, and Bruce Hamaker, Director & Professor, Purdue University’s International Food Technology Center. (DOWNLOAD PRESENTATION)
2. Cassava Processing and Market Development in Nigeria – Gbassey Tarawali, Project Manager for CEDP and MARKETS, International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (via webinar). (DOWNLOAD PRESENTATION)
3. Strategies for Fast Tracking Market Developments for Food Products in Africa -Manjeet Chinnan, Professor of Food Engineering, Department of Food Science and Technology, University of Georgia and Anna Resurreccion, Professor, Department of Food Science and Technology, University of Georgia. (DOWNLOAD PRESENTATION)
4. Food Processing and Value Addition: Case Studies from Partners in Food Solutions - Jeff Dykstra, Executive Director, Partners in Food Solutions (via webinar). (DOWNLOAD PRESENTATION)
5. Scaling Up Public-Private Investments for Food Processing and Value Addition – Jacklyn Claxton, Private Sector Advisor, Bureau for Food Security, USAID. (DOWNLOAD PRESENTATION)

Michigan State University to Implement New Feed the Future Agricultural Research Training Program

7 August 2012. America’s Michigan State University has received a $7.3 million grant that will be channelled towards building the capacity of agricultural scientists in Africa as the continent struggles to achieve food security.

The project dubbed Borlaug Higher Education Agricultural Research and Development after Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Norman Borlaug, will begin in Ghana, Uganda, Mali, Mozambique as well as Bangladesh in Asia.

The program funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Bureau for Food Security will strengthen agricultural research institutions and support long-term training of agricultural researchers at the master’s- and doctoral-degree levels.

According to Eric Crawford, professor of agricultural, food and resource economics, the five countries have similar priorities seeking to increase agricultural productivity, reduce trade and transportation barriers, develop sound market-based principles for agriculture, accelerate rural growth and development and improving nutrition.

The project is part of Feed the Future, the US government’s global hunger and food security initiative, which aims at strengthening agricultural research institutions and support long-term training of agricultural researchers at the master’s- and doctoral-degree levels.

“MSU (Michigan State University) has 50-plus years of engagement in Africa, and we are currently managing several Master of Science and Ph.D. training programs whose objectives and program design are similar to those of this initiative. MSU faculty is well versed in planning, designing and managing training and human capacity-building programs, especially in plant breeding, food science and food security, which are key areas of Feed the Future."

The program which will kick off in 2013, will comprise of 30 master’s degree candidates and 10 doctoral degree candidates in its first cohort.

2012 US-Africa Forum: Farming Is A Business

11 - 12 June , 2012. Washington. The Partnership to Cut Hunger and Poverty in Africa, the Joaquim Chissano Foundation, and the John A. Kufuor Foundation held the 2012 US-Africa Forum, on “Farming Is A Business: Strengthening Linkages and Skills to Transform Africa’s Food Systems.”

The Forum reviewed the significant evolution of Africa’s agricultural development and food systems over the past decade, assess the transformations currently underway, and envision the changes that are likely to occur in the next decade and beyond.

This was the fourth annual US-Africa Forum hosted by the Partnership, but this year’s event marks the first time the Forum will be co-hosted with African partner institutions. Former Presidents Joaquim Chissano and John Kufuor have been instrumental in elevating food security and agriculture to the top of the development agenda in Mozambique and Ghana, and their leadership extends across the continent and around the globe.

The Forum featured a mix of keynote speakers, plenary presentations, and guided breakout group discussions that drove toward the identification of a practical set of recommendations and actions.

Private Sector Perspectives for Strengthening Agribusiness Value Chains in Africa: Case Studies from Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya and Mali

May 2012. Private Sector Perspectives for Strengthening Agribusiness Value Chains in Africa: Case Studies from Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya and Mali. Partnership Report by Mima Nedelcovych and David Shiferaw.

Value chains have been accepted as an effective way of focusing on measures to improve the scale and impact of private sector investments, which include the investments made by smallholder farmers themselves as well as those made by larger-scale domestic or foreign agribusiness investors. Development partners have adopted value chain approaches when designing interventions and project implementation to coordinate their support to specific sectors and commodities. Particularly due to the emphasis on targeted value chains by the US Government’s Feed the Future Initiative, a better understanding of the linkages being made (or missed) along a value chain will be essential to realizing the returns that they promise.

This report is a summary of observations made in four country studies: Mali, Ghana, Kenya and Ethiopia. The findings suggest that African governments have significant opportunities to take actions that would directly stimulate private investments in agriculture. The private investors interviewed believed that, with greater government support in creating an enabling environment and less direct government intervention in value chains, critical barriers to their businesses would be reduced or eliminated. Observations specific to the four countries and four agricultural commodity value chains are summarized below and call for practical reforms that promote the growth of successful agribusinesses and more productive farming in Africa.

Agribusiness Perspectives - Summary of Findings - May 2012.pdf

Agribusiness Perspectives - Case Studies and Annexes - May 2012.pdf

Pilot for protecting against counterfeit crop protection products

Anecdotal evidence collected across all agribusiness sectors in 12 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa indicates that counterfeit agricultural inputs account for more than 30 percent of all retail agro-input purchases. 

Unscrupulous entrepreneurs produce counterfeit pesticide packaging and fill it with inert product, sell inferior grain as quality seed and palm gravel off as fertilizer.  Neither law enforcement agencies nor Ministries of Agriculture nor the private sector have been able to make any real headway in reducing this illegal trading which, according to Felix Jumbe, Executive Director of the Seed Trade Association of Malawi, “makes the poor poorer.”

Felix Jumbe

With support from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) through theCommon Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), IFDC is helping eliminate counterfeit crop protection products (CPPs). IFDC staff members have designed a simple counter-measure and, in partnership with CropLife Africa Middle East (CLAME) and CropLife Uganda, IFDC is launching a pilot program to scientifically test the effectiveness of the methodology. CLAME, a member of CropLife International, is a regional federation representing the plant science industry and a network of national associations in 30 countries in Africa and the Middle East. Read more

USAID and Impact Investors Capitalize new Equity Fund for East African Agribusiness

September 28, 2011. A new fund has been set up by a group of impact investors and a US government agency to drive growth in East Africa’s troubled agricultural sector. Already, $25 million has been invested into the African Agricultural Capital Fund (AACF) by the US Agency for International Development (USAid) and impact investors, who include Bill &Melinda Gates Foundation, the Gatsby Charitable Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation.

Pearl Capital Partners, a Kampala-based specialised African agricultural investment fund manager, will be responsible for investing the funds in at least 20 agriculture-related small and medium-sized enterprises in East Africa over the next five years.

“The AACF will catalyse the growth of small and medium agribusinesses in East Africa,” said Julie Sunderland, the director of programme-related investments at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. She added that since they work with smallholder farmers across the agricultural value-chain, these businesses are important for the sector’s sustainable development.

However, according to the managing partner of PCP, Tom Adlam, a funding gap exists for small-cap agricultural businesses across East Africa, between large-scale commercial banks and microfinance institutions.

“This new fund will help to address this gap, providing long-term capital to entrepreneurs who are building businesses in the agriculture sector while delivering quality financial returns for investors,” Mr Adlam added.
In fact, there is optimism that the establishment of the fund could signal a change in fortunes for the businesses.
“We are optimistic that the success of AACF and the individual businesses within its portfolio will encourage additional capital investment in enterprises employing, purchasing from, and providing inputs and services to smallholders,” said Ms Sunderland.

The CEO of the Global Impact Investing Network, Luther Ragin, Jr, concurred that collaboration between the diverse investors would result in increased capital to the sustainable African agricultural sector.

Besides targeting positive financial returns, the fund is also interested in having significant social impact through provision of employment, secure markets and improved products for smallholder farmers across East Africa.

German Marshall Fund of the United States launches Initiative to Strengthen Food Security in Africa

October 10, 2011. The German Marshall Fund recently launched the high-level Transformational Partnerships in Food Security in Africa: A Transatlantic Experts Group, whose American, European, and African members will identify and propose partnerships that drive positive change and lead to scalable food security programs, based on a shared vision among public and private sector actors. The group is co-chaired by GMF Senior Transatlantic Fellows Jim Kolbe and Jean-Michel Severino.

Click here to view all members of the Transatlantic Experts Group.

Under the guidance of the co-chairs and with input from group members, GMF will conduct consultations and hold workshops with government officials and experts in East Africa, the United States, and Europe to formulate recommendations on transformational partnerships to increase food security on a meaningful scale. At the group’s initial meetings in Brussels and Washington, members from think tanks, civil society, multilateral organizations, and government agencies, including The World Bank, USAID, UNDP, Wal-Mart, and the European Commission, debated the challenges and opportunities facing African food security partnerships and outlined an agenda for the coming months.

A final report will be released in Stockholm in early 2012, with shorter policy briefs and recommendations to be released in the interim.