AGRA

Amid the disruption of the Covid-19 pandemic, Debisi Araba, presses the positive case for the future of African agriculture. “There is no reason why we can’t be self-sufficient and able to feed the world,” he says at the end of our hour-long conversation.

But throughout the conversation he also emphasises that the “transformation journey” will not take place overnight and will rely on cooperation between government and the private sector. A process that is “public-sector enabled and private-sector led” is his formula for success.

It was in May that Debisi took up his post as managing director of AGRF, the forum that brings together the major stakeholders in Africa’s agricultural landscape every year. But despite his young age, Araba has been at the forefront of African agriculture for many years. A senior adviser in 2015 to the former minister of agriculture of Nigeria, Akinwumi Adesina, the current president of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Araba also served as regional director for Africa at the International Centre for Tropical Agriculture, which aims to bring an evidence-based approach to decision making around agriculture.

The question on everybody’s mind is the impact Covid-19 has had on African agriculture. UN agencies have predicted a global food emergency due to border restrictions, slowing harvests and a loss of income for farmers. Globally, markets have so far proven resilient with stocks of most staple foods adequate. The worry is that unless sustainable action is taken, food shortages, disrupted supply chains, lower production and rising prices could emerge. Coupled with the locust invasion in East Africa and the continuing challenge of climate change, the African continent is far from immune to collateral damage from Covid-19.

Araba says the pandemic has been a stress test to global food systems, exposing the “soft underbelly that we’ve taken for granted”. Africa has shown some resilience  but the full impact is yet to be felt in terms of future harvests and loss of income, he says. Political will to take remedial action will be necessary to avert the worst effects, he says, noting that there has been a heightened sense of awareness. Nevertheless, he would like to see more urgency: the continent needs to focus on ramping up production. This year’s AGRF Summit will address many of these themes (see below).

Raising the profile of agriculture

He hopes the pandemic will raise the importance of agriculture in government priorities and warns of the consequences of inaction. 

“There are health implications if people don’t have access to healthy and nutritious foods: in other words malnutrition from poor harvests and lack of access to foods,” he says. “There are economic implications. And there are political implications. We have seen governments fall because of inadequate food policies, not just in Africa but around the world. We saw that in Thailand with the rice farmers because of a subsidy programme that didn’t work out.”

He fears that a lot of small and medium enterprises in agriculture will go out of business unless governments take the necessary action to support them, as they have for airlines and the hospitality trade. That needs political leadership, whether through a support fund, insurance mechanism systems or other fiscal incentives. Araba is confident the pandemic will reinforce the need for investment and reform and will bring about fundamental changes. 

“We need to invest in infrastructure and technologies. There are means and measures to dampen the effect [like using] cold storage and cold chain supply and using modern technologies like solar powered cooling systems.” 

There is room for greater collaboration at a continental level, especially in terms of data. Araba has been touting the need for the continent to collate data of grain reserves and government and private food stocks. These simple measures will help map stocks so that when a crisis hits an accurate food map of the continent exists to help manage surpluses and shortages in a more effective manner. This can then be integrated into an interconnected trading platform, to help trade within Africa and enable Africa to set the terms of its global trade. 

This is all part of “being more deliberate”, he explains. “Right now, every planting season is done with hope. Every harvest is met with uncertainty in terms of how much you’re going to sell and at which price.”

Araba is an advocate of the private sector being at the heart of the transformation. Like the AfDB’s Adesina, Araba wants people to look at agriculture as a profitable business sector. “Agriculture is not something you do when all else has failed,” he says. “Agribusiness is complicated, and that’s why it needs serious, business-minded people who are dedicated and intelligent to make a success of it.”

Transforming agriculture

But it also needs supportive government policy. His home market of Nigeria offers an interesting case study in the controversies of agricultural policy. While the government is keen to encourage domestic production, central bank activity to limit access to foreign exchange for importers of maize has proved controversial. 

One outcome that policymakers should expect is a rise in the price of maize, and “as a policymaker you need to be comfortable with the consequences of this action,” he explains.

He’d like to see a programme focused on increasing productivity, investing in seed systems, mechanisation and security so that cultivation areas are not threatened by encroaching livestock. Investment in irrigation and roads and market systems will smoothen volatility. 

“Transformation is about moving from one way of doing things to another, better way. The yield gap is there and Nigeria needs to increase productivity when it comes to producing maize.” 

He lauds entrepreneurial Nigerian businesses like Babban Gona Farms and Tomato Jos that have introduced innovations to the business model, outperformed national average yields and built strong businesses.

“It requires a cohesive and sustained assault on the challenges holding productivity back,” says Araba. “So I’d like to see everything [central bank policy alongside a programme focused on production and productivity] happening at the same time. And we should not simply focus on maize for domestic consumption.

“This is where I think we miss the core message: Nigeria should be a global agriculture and food powerhouse and a net exporter, supplying maize to West Africa. We need people with big ambitions both in the public and private sector. We’re starting to see these people.”

The 2020 AGRF summit

The theme of the 2020 AGRF Summit, “Feed the Cities, Grow the Continent”, was chosen last November, long before the pandemic struck. But it is prescient, says Araba, with urban centres particularly vulnerable to shocks.

“We need to have an honest conversation on agri­culture and food, what we grow, how we process it, what we consume and in what quantities,” he says. “We need to understand what future we want and how Africa can play a greater role in global food production and do so in a more sustainable and cohesive manner.”

This year’s gathering will take place online from  8-11 September and will be centred around four broad issues:

1. Resilience: investing in enterprises and innovations to build a sustainable and inclusive future
2. Markets and trade: building inter-connected African markets to create opportunities across the supply chain
3. Nutritious food: creating markets for African products that fuel diverse, healthy diets
4. Food systems: looking at the whole agricultural ecosystem to ensure Africa is producing the right foods in a sustainable manner.

High-level dignitaries and private-sector experts will debate the questions and registered delegates will be able to pose questions to speakers via integrated chat functions, as well as via social media.

The summit will provide a platform for Africa to sort out its priorities ahead of the UN Food Systems Conference taking place in 2021. 

“AGRF is the confluence of the ideas, energy and drive of the agriculture and food sector in Africa,” says Araba. “My message to the general public is that people are working day and night to ensure our food systems thrive. To government, we need to work even harder but we can lean on each other for support and knowledge. And to the private sector, it is through their ingenuity and persistence that economies thrive, but they need to make their voices heard by the public sector. Private enterprise does not thrive in silence.” 

Despite the difficulties of the pandemic, climate change, and East African locust swarms, 2020 has also seen impressive cooperation among multilateral agencies and governments, including the World Bank, the FAO, and the AfDB. AGRA is leading the way by providing technical support to national governments to align resources in response to Covid-19. 

“Africa will not wilt in the face of this pandemic,” says Araba. 

For more information about the AGRF Summit go to www.agrf.org

Source: https://africanbusinessmagazine.com/sectors/agriculture/agrf-md-debisi-araba-africa-can-feed-the-world/

AGRA is pleased to release the Policy Brief: “Building Resilient Agriculture Systems”. It asks the question “Are agriculture syst⁸ems well prepared to withstand high impact shocks such as the COVID-19 pandemic, and, faced with such shocks, are they resilient?”. The Policy Brief provides short term and long term recommendations to governments to support resilient agriculture systems within  the COVID-19 pandemic.

Read it here – https://agra.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Policy-Brief-Vulnerability-of-the-agriculture-sector-to-shocks-7-10-20.pdf

AGRA’s June Food Security Monitor finds multiple shocks are disrupting agricultural farming systems in sub Saharan Africa

Published monthly, AGRA’s Food Security Monitor focuses on developments and changes that impact on regional food trade in each of AGRA’s 11 focus countries and the follow-on implications for food security. 

Findings from the June Food Security Monitor include:

·       The multiple shocks in many parts of the continent are causing severe disruptions to agricultural farming systems with devastating impacts on affected populations.

·       The continued food price spikes in some parts of the continent demonstrate the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and containment measures on food and nutrition security in Africa.

·       The continued disruption of food distribution and trade activities due to the COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated the need for countries to reduce their import dependency and increase domestic food production to ensure self-sufficiency.

The June Food Security Monitor is available here.  

About the Food Security Monitor

The Food Security Monitor provides information about changes in climate and other environmental factors on food production and implications for food trade as well as food and nutrition security; review of government interventions that impact on food trade (domestic and regional); and an overview assessment of the prices of main food staples and the food security outlook in the AGRA focus countries in East, Southern and West Africa. We welcome feedback to Charles Nhemachena, cnhemachena [@] agra.org

AGRA’s 2019 annual report is out. Read it here – https://agra.org/ar-2019/

Last year, after six years at the helm, Strive Masiyawa, outgoing chair of AGRA handed the reins to H.E. Hailemariam Desalegn. As a former PrimeMinister of Ethiopia, he is more aware than most of the transformative effects of agriculture on a country’s economy. Ethiopia was once synonymous with drought and hunger – an estimated million deaths were caused by the 1980s’ famine – it now has a thriving agricultural sector and was declared food self-sufficient in 2016. As his excellency says, if it is possible in Ethiopia, it is possible anywhere.

Climate change and population growth remain threats, and now a global pandemic can be added to the list of challenges facing the continent. COVID-19 has yet to deliver the same devastation delivered to other regions, but if some predictions are right 190 million Africans could fall victim to the virus in the next 12 months. Although crisis response is not a core part of AGRA’s work, to avoid the potentially disastrous impact of the virus on food systems, AGRA engaged governments early in 2020 to ensure food insecurity will not rise, consistent with 2019’s focus on resilience. As AGRA continues to build systems to counteract natural disasters and climatic events it responded to outbreaks of Fall armyworm in Uganda, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Tanzania, Mozambique and Ghana, plus desert locusts in East Africa and Cyclone Idai in Mozambique.

AGRA is well placed to confront these challenges. In the next decade, they aim to get Africa’s agriculture system to work sustainably without external interventions. To do so it will continue the partnership model it has pioneered, bringing together governments, NGOs, the private sector and farmer organizations. The new Strategic Framework 2030 will scale,accelerate and create conditions for agricultural transformation. Meanwhile, four years into its five-year strategy, integration is at the heart of everything AGRA does – multiple systems working together to deliver fertilizer, seeds and knowledge to smallholder famers. Three pillars remain at the core of its strategy: state capacity, supporting governments to create enabling environments in which agriculture and farmers can thrive; systems development, from technologies to village shops, to ensure farmers get the products and services they need; and partnerships to accelerate investment and innovation. AGRA is unlocking scale and plugging gaps in Africa’s agricultural systems, bringing services ever closer to farmers.

In just five years, integration has halved the distance travelled by farmers to access inputs. It has gone beyond program implementation, moving away from short-term projects focussed on funding and outputs, to a long-term strategy that drives systemic change. In 2019, AGRA carefully assessed how integration is working with a number of studies and confirmed its agribusiness platforms are generating investment in soil facilities and seed production, giving greater access to credit, creating opportunities for SMEs and its national flagship programs are helping governments to unify disparate activities.

In 2019, AGRA reached over 4.5 million farmers, 32% were women, made $139 million of grant investments across 11 countries, leveraged $800 million in private capital and made 62 new grant commitments totalling $27.5 million. Meanwhile, it reached 1.5 million farmers through digital finance initiatives, supported production of 21,230 MT of certified seed that went to 849,200 farmers, and identified and trained 15,193 new village based advisers to reach over 4.5 million farmers. Overarching all this, AGRA engaged all 11 focus country governments in policy landscaping and benchmarking exercises.

Last year, Ghana hosted the 9th African Green Revolution Forum, the continent’s premier agriculture event. Its Agribusiness Deal Room continued its success by supporting new business deals and saw 117 SMEs seeking $800 million in capital engage with more than 40 investors and financial institutions through 350 scheduled meetings.

AGRA continues its policy to decentralize by deploying staff closer to farmers and markets. 61% of that staff are technical – 211 in total – and there is a continued focus on women who now represent 35% of its beneficiaries. Although this is up 5% on the previous year, it is acknowledged there is still some way to go before that percentage correlates with the numbers engaged in agriculture. Kenya’s phone-based access to credit for agriculture scheme saw 54% of $9.38 million of loans it facilitated go to women, and in line with their stated objective of including more young people in agriculture, 52% of these loans were to the under 40s.

There is no doubt that agriculture remains Africa’s surest path to economic growth. AGRA has an important role to play. In the words of its president, Dr. Agnes Kalibata, “it reaches and enables the disenfranchised, bolsters fragile states and systems, and helps to build a more sustainable world”. AGRA drives the bulk of its investments Partnership for Inclusive Agricultural Transformation in Africa (PIATA). The founding members of the partnership include the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The UK Department for International Development (DFID) has recently joined the partnership, bring greater focus on regional food markets and food trade through policy predictability and market systems development. The German Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development, BMZ, is currently a non-voting member and a resource partner, co-financing AGRA’s strategy in Burkina Faso and Ghana.

Rice farming has been an age-long practice in communities across Niger, a largely agrarian state in Northern Nigeria. For years, they have clung to traditional rice planting, harvesting and processing methods as well as market distribution, which all resulted in low profit.

In addition, they are being plagued routinely with inadequate aggregation centres, high-interest rate loans and price instability due to poor processing methods.

The lack of aggregation center meant that farmers had to travel far to different locations in other to sell their products, spending more money in the process.

Being a major source of income for majority of the people in the community, poor profits from rice sales meant that families could barely take care of their basic household needs.

However in 2019, Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) changed the narrative when it began working with rice farmers across the state to help improve cultivation, production and sales, believing that progress in Africa’s agricultural transformation agenda would only come with great harvest.

With huge support, a number of female rice producers organized themselves into a group called the Lemu Women Rice Processors for the project in Gbako Local Government Area of the state.

AGRA organized trainings for these women and youths on agro-input and output market distribution, including rice processing which has greatly helped the Lemu Women Rice Processors Group to be sufficient and maximize their profit.

With this, new agro-input dealers emerged from the training such as Tecni Seed, Da-All Green and more.  AGRA also established successfully linkages to source finance from the Lemu Microfinance Bankwith agreements brokered by SG 2000 and NAMDA.

Now, the Lemu Women Rice Processors group can acquire finance through aggregation, securing N200, 000 to N400, 000 per person. with the support of AGRA project. The group started recycling rice through processing, marketing while making up to N400 profit per bag.

There is now a bigger market oppurtunity based on how clean the rice is which has more value. The Faro 44 and 52 variety of rice is cleaner than the traditional variety grown

Through its actions of strategic value chain partners, AGRA has increased the capacities of youth and women, with lessons built around entrepreneurship focused on the rice value chain. It has also successfully contributed in eliminating the need for food importation narrowing the country’s demand gap of over two million tons of rice, specifically in Gbako LGA of Niger state, where there are a lot of women entrepreneurs involved in formal and informal agribusinesses.

The Nigerian Rice Consortium with the help of Partnership for Inclusisive Agricultural Transformation in Africa (PIATA) program continue to build the capacity of youth and women for employment  in the Rice value chain which presents a lot of business and enterprise development opportunities from input marketing,  production, processing and marketing of finished rice.

The training provided by AGRA has not only helped the Lemu processors to set up fully equipped community resource centres, but has also provided them with the opportunity to expand their trade.

In the words of Mariam, one of the women beneficiaries, “the benefits of AGRA teaching us how to properly process rice without stones and chaff has increased profitability of how much we sell a mudu of rice; previously unprocessed rice sold for three hundred to three hundred and fifty naira only (N300-350) now processed rice sells for between four hundred and fifty and five hundred naira (N450-500).”

With the extra profit, Mariam is now able to take care of the basic needs in her family, which includes provision of food and clothes for her kids as well as payment of other bill.

For several decades, youths in Makarfi Local Government, Kaduna State in the Northern parts of Nigeria were involved in spraying activities of pesticides and herbicides on farms. It is their only source of income due to the high employment rate in their community, they earned meager amounts that was barely enough for them to feed their households and provide other basic family needs.

This was largely due to lack of awareness on proper and modern spraying techniques. They were unaware that different crops required different pesticides and herbicides. The lack of knowledge subsequently created huge crop losses on different parts of the farms, which didn’t guarantee their payment. In addition, the youths were at risk exposing their selves without wearing personal protective equipment while spraying.

The story changed in 2019, when the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) partnered with Partnership for Inclusive Agricultural transformation in Africa (PIATA) to train three corpertives groups on proper spraying techniques while scaling up spraying activities in Markarfi.

Mustapha Shuaibu, a community-based facilitator said the selection process involved a lot of research, the youths in the cooperatives were also interviewed about their challenges and spraying techniques to ensure they required training.

A total of 50 youth were chosen,  they were trained on how to better handle pesticides; use of the appropraite persticides for specific crops, spray effectively as well as the use of personal protective equipment to protect themselves. They were also provided with some equipment at the end of the training to ensure they continue to have an opportunity to work because smallholder farmers largely dominate Markarfi community creating a profitable market for sprayers.

The youths became experts and highly knowledgeable in the act of spraying, now they get contracted by farmers to spray their farms, tend to their crops and their payments are guaranteed. Spraying activities in Gimi community have completely changed the narrative for numerous of youths and households who can now adequately take care of themselves.

With more youths acquiring skill sets and gaining strength, there has been an opportunity to collaborate between government and businesses while keeping up with the rapidly evolving demand within the agricultural sector. With the help of AGRA, one of the beneficiary sprayer Mohammed said “I used the money we get from working on people’s farms to take my Jamb examinations for University adimission. Luckily I scored 250,  I want to study medicine at the Kaduna State University, I’m just waiting for the admission. This is  good improvement for me. I can’t express what I have gained from the program; we thank God.”

Rice production has been a major source of livelihood for people in Giwa Iganchi,  Local Government,  Kaduna State  in the Northern  part of Nigeria. For several decades, Giwa community cultivated rice and milled it at the Giwa Iganchi Commercial Maize F.C.S Rice Mill Enterprise. Sadly, throughout these years, they were completely depended on traditional farming, planting local varieties of the crop and ancient milling techniques a practice, which often resulted in low yields and profits.

During their rice parboiling process, the women to soaked their paddies in water for several hours to soften the Kernel, re-wash it again and steam it before sun drying. After this, the rice is milled with old machines that are unable to adequately remove stones and polish the grains. This usually results in a substandard poor quality in comparison to the imported rice in the market, which sells for a lower amount.

In late 2019, the Giwa Iganchi Commercial Maize F.C.S Rice Mill Enterprise was selected by SG 2000 and the Kaduna Agricultural Development Agency (KADA) to participate in the project that would transform the entire rice farming process and production.

Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) -Kaduna State Consortium project in partnership with the Partnership for Inclusive Agrricultural Transformation in Africa (PIATA) conducted trainings and the facilitatedpartnerships between the local communities and reputable rural agro-industrialists.

AGRA’s intervention in the production and milling process has greatly improved the entire rice value chain. Farmers now make better choices with seed and practice modern fasrming. The introduction of high yielding rice varieties as well as modern milling machines and techniques has improved the milling enterprise in Giwa.

Mr. Abubakar, one of the beneficiaries of the trainings mentioned the new milling machine has brought a lot of benefits to them and they can now employ more people with the profits from the business.

Now, they are able to mill between 30-40 bags per day, resulting in a more finished product that is at the same standard as imported rice. This has created an oppurtunity for new markets while competing  in local markets.

Abdulrahman who works at the mill, said the experience with the AGRA project was transformative,  the rice mill has brought about an increase in the production of high-quality finished products and an improvement in the standard of living.

He said, “My profit has improved, constant growth and i have been able to help employ more hands. As you can see, there are people carrying out different roles in the processing, chaff removal, operators and so on. The number of bags processed daily determines how much each is paid, usual between N1000- N1500 daily.”

In Nigeria, crop production is an old tradition, many families in the country solely depends on it for the provision of their basic needs. However, the lack of access to quality seeds has affected crop productivity, making it difficult to guarantee production and for families to adequately meet their basic needs.

Over the years, smallholder farmers have lost millions of naira due to fake, seeds. More than 50% of crop seeds sold in the country are sub-standard and sometimes fake. Farmers have complained about the exposure to illegal seed practices, including counterfeit seeds, fake seeds, fraudulent labelling and regulatory offences.

In addition to destroying the economic prospects of the country, the continuous use of illegal seeds has reduced investment by breeders and seed producers to develop, produce and deliver better quality seeds.

In 2020, the National Agricultural Seed Council (NASC) with the support of Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) introduced the NASC SEEDCODEX, an electronic seed authentication tag to provide farmers with quality assurance through tracking, traceability and provision of quality seeds.

The new tag will have a scratch-off code which will complement the existing tags of the  Seed Council, would be attached to the pack of every seeds sold in Nigeria. Smallholder farmers are happy to hear this and have embraced the innovation.

During the unveiling ceremony of the SEEDCODEX, President of the All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN), Arc Kabiru Ibrahim said the SEEDCODEX will promote farmer’s access to better seed breeds which will help farmers withstand harsher droughts, extreme heat and unpredictable flood associated with climate change.

This initiative is expected to help farmers substantially boost and guarantee harvest, generate more income to take care of their basic family needs.

With the new scratch-off code, farmers are now able to send certain codes via SMS and get instant response to verify the authenticty of the seed. The access to high-quality seeds enables farmers to boost their crop productivity while improving their livelihoods.

Participants expressed cautious optimism that despite the impact of COVI-19, Nigeria’s ag sector is ensuring access to quality food at prices people can afford

AGRA’s webinar, “Securing the 2020 cropping season in the face of COVID 19 Pandemic”, held on June 4, 2020 brought together experts in Nigeria’s agricultural landscape to share their perspectives on  the impact of COVID 19 on Nigeria’s agriculture sector. The discussion brought together representatives from the donor community, government and the private sector. The session was led by Dr Abdulkadir Muazu, Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, and was moderated by Dr. George Bigirwa, Deputy Vice President, Program Innovations and Delivery – Technical, AGRA.  Participants noted that early actions taken by government and the private sector  included the provision of free good quality seeds to farmers, innovative financing mechanisms for farmers, social supports, and the classification of inputs as essential important in the upcoming planting season. They also discussed provision extension and advisory services, roles of women  and the support the development partners for effective post COVID response. As a result of these actions, participants were cautiously optimistic that Nigeria’s ag sector  is able to continue providing access to quality food at prices people can afford, while ensuring that farmers and the private sector can still make money. 

For more information: Dr. Kehinde Makinde, AGRA Country Manger Nigeria; kmakinde@agra.org