AGRA

• H.E. Hailemariam Dessalegn was in Zambia on a three-day visit that saw him attend the fourth Mid-Year Coordination Meeting of the African Union, Regional Economic Communities and Regional Mechanisms
• H.E. Dessalegn met with H.E. President Hakainde Hichilema, Hon. Agriculture Minister Mtolo Phiri, and COMESA leaders

LUSAKA, Zambia: July 19, 2022 – Former Ethiopia Prime Minister, and Board Chair of AGRA, H.E. Hailemariam Dessalegn has urged Africa’s leaders to collaborate in addressing the triple-threat problem – climate change, COVID-19, and the Russia Ukraine Conflict – that has recently worsened the continent’s food security situation.

He was speaking during the fourth Mid-Year Coordination Meeting of the African Union, Regional Economic Communities and Regional Mechanisms, in Lusaka, Zambia on Sunday.

Citing the latest Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report, which showed that 60% of the world’s poor now live in Africa, H.E. Dessalegn highlighted the need for quick action.

“There is a sense of urgency here if we are to transform the continent’s agriculture and food systems, we need to join forces across countries and regions. We need to build systems and institutions that can deliver the agriculture sector, markets, and trade to our farmers with the strong capacity and expertise to match” he said.

He further urged Africa’s institutions and development organizations to team up and together support the solutions needed to lift the continent out of the rut that it is currently stuck in.

“We need better coordination among our organizations, with dedicated capacity for RECs (Regional Economic Communities) and between the African Union Commission and the Africa Union Development Agency (AUDA-NEPAD) to be able to respond to the challenges at hand,” he said, while offering AGRA’s support, which comprises over 200 experts from 29 African countries to support the process.

H.E. Dessalegn met with H.E. President Hakainde Hichilema to discuss his country’s progress in transforming the national pathways to food systems established during last year’s UN Food Systems Summit and strategies for a sustainable transition.

The conversation also addressed Zambia’s role in regional food trade and the support required of AGRA. H.E. Dessalegn further used the opportunity to invite H.E. Hichilema to the AGRF 2022 Summit, set for September 5 – 9 in Kigali, Rwanda.

Separately, H.E. Dessalegn met with Zambia’s Minister for Agriculture, Hon. Mtolo Phiri for discussions on the country’s priorities for agricultural transformation. He later engaged leaders from the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) on matters related to regional integration, and AGRA’s role in supporting the process.

-ENDS

About AGRA

AGRA is a farmer-centered, African-led, partnerships-driven institution that is working to transform smallholder farming from a solitary struggle to survive to a business that thrives. In collaboration with its partners—including African governments, researchers, development partners, the private sector and civil society— AGRA’s work primarily focuses on smallholder farmers – men and women who typically cultivate staple crops on two hectares or less. AGRA is now recognized across the continent as a strong voice for African rural development, a prosperous agricultural economy, and for supporting thousands of small African businesses and millions of African families to improve agriculture to ensure food security and improve their livelihoods.

More information: https://agra.org ; Rebecca Weaver, rweaver@agra.org;

Inadequacy and fragility of food systems becomes more apparent with every food crisis. The question we must answer is “Where do we go from here?”. Agnes Kalibata, President of AGRA, discusses these issues and more.

The food price crisis of 2007 to 2008, Covid-19, the Russian war against Ukraine, and climate change have exposed the fragility of food systems. The greatest risk lies in refusing to learn from lessons of the past.

At the start of 2022, we were already facing the prospect of a food crisis. Even before the first Russian tank rolled across Ukraine’s borders on 24 February, food prices had tipped record highs as the world struggled to recover from Covid-19 to repair disrupted supply chains and soaring fuel and gas prices. But a conflict involving two of the world’s largest wheat exporters, and major producers of fertilizer, maize and vegetable oil, have inevitably driven prices even higher and, once again, pushed the issue of global food security into sharp focus.

Russia and Ukraine together account for roughly 30 per cent of the world’s wheat and barley exports, a fifth of its corn trade and almost 80 per cent of sunflower oil exports. Most of their wheat production is imported by countries in the Middle East and Africa, with some 50 countries depending on Russia and Ukraine. Warfare and port blockades have reduced these exports, and supply uncertainties have already pushed wheat prices to around $11 per bushel, a level last seen in 2008. The FAO food price index soared to a record high in June.

The situation is further compounded by rising energy prices, and disruptions to the supply of fertilisers, the prices of which are already fluctuating at levels unseen since the global financial crisis because of higher gas prices. Russia and Belarus produce more than a third of global potash. Russia is also the world’s biggest exporter of fertilizers and the war with Ukraine has disrupted the export of fertilizers and driven up prices for natural gas, which is an important ingredient of nitrogen-based fertilizers. Fertilizer prices (DAP) are surging towards 1000 USD per ton, with a significant increase in the last 6 months, and a 40% jump since the invasion. This will hurt rich and poor farmers alike, due to the clear link between rising costs and reduced production.

The US-based Center for Global Development estimates that higher food and fuel prices will push 40 million more people into extreme poverty.

Lower income households, who were already spending between 60 and 80 per cent of their earnings on food, face stark choices, including how many meals to eat in a day.

In Tunisia, the fear of food shortages combined with the imminent arrival of Ramadan, caused panic buying and emptied supermarket shelves. Kenyans are protesting rising food prices on social media with the hashtag #lowerfoodprices. Thousands of maize farmers in Ethiopia have been protesting soaring fertilizer prices. And let’s not forget that it was rising food prices that led to the 2019 Sudan coup and the Arab Spring rebellion of 2008.

The food crisis of 2007-8 suggests important lessons for us to mitigate a food crisis this year. First, remember that cooperation between countries matters, sending important signals to markets that governments and the private sector take the problem seriously. Second, take concerted action to trade more, easier, faster. Allow food to be traded and attack non-tariff barriers that are the most serious limitations to trade. Africa has shown leadership in the creation of the African Continental Free Trade Area – these principles must be fast tracked to allow as friction-free trading system as possible. Third, governments and development partners should urgently plan for the social and humanitarian consequences of a food crisis. Social safety nets should be strengthened at least temporarily, and humanitarian aid planned for the most vulnerable. Last and perhaps most importantly, governments and partners must go back to basics: that African economies and livelihoods are built on agriculture. More than 70 per cent of the population is involved in farming, but the vast majority of these are smallholdings with significant exposure to environmental and economic shocks. These farmers and their contributions can be transformed by shorter value chains that share some of the value with farmers, a digital revolution that puts farmers, and strong government agenda and support.

African farmers, if given the opportunities that their European, Asian and North American counterparts have, can increase massively their productivity and grow their businesses.

An emergency plan to build support for farmers now can send important signals to markets and increase production this year. Give farmers access to productive, climate smart seeds, the knowledge they need to become more productive, and innovative financial tools to invest. Then help them get their products to market. Proven models are already used by many partners – millions of farmers can be lifted quickly in this way.

At the same time, soaring fertilizer prices must be addressed with urgent action to increase efficiency. AGRA has promoted technologies that can reduce cost to the farmer including the use of blended fertilizers, as we already see in Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda. The same is true in the use of micro-dosing. Both give much more ‘bang for the buck’ and can be much more environmentally friendly. This is also an opportunity to promote greater use of farmers’ traditional practices of regeneration and organic fertilization.

We learned from the last food crisis that we should not be afraid of a food crisis. What we should be worried about is lack of action once we understand the problem. Governments should lead and coordinate, private sector should target investment on proven solutions, and unlock African farmers’ potential.

Originally posted on https://www.weltohnehunger.org

In the last five years, Africa has endured several shocks and stresses – from locust and Fall Army Worm attacks to droughts in Eastern Africa and floods in Southern Africa.  Most of us thought that COVID-19 was the last straw and we prayed that the camel’s back would hold.  And it nearly did for most countries until the current Russia Ukraine crisis that has fueled multiple crises; conflict, fuel and food.  The real challenge and the reason the camel’s back is now breaking, is the debt burden that Africa countries are sitting with. For these countries, stepping forward to support the private sector, farmers or vulnerable communities is not something they can do – however much they might want to.

The ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine is worsening the situation by limiting the supply of fertilizer – a critical agricultural input, and without which the continent’s next few harvests will be severely compromised. Africa was already not using enough fertilizers and as a result still grapples with low yields.  Total lack of fertilizers is likely to have catastrophic impact.

Yet the biggest threat for the continent remains climate change, which has drastically shifted rainfall patterns and accounts for the perennial droughts and floods being experienced around the continent.

“Africa’s biggest challenge is the frequency and ferocity of climate change … . Climate change on top of the RUC is going to have dire implications on food security in the months ahead,” said, Dr. Agnes Kalibata, President of AGRA.

Dr. Kalibata was speaking at an African Dialogue Series webinar that brought together policy and decision makers, civil society, experts, and the academia to discuss the strategies for building resilient socio-agricultural food systems, with a leaning on nutrition.

A turnaround away from the looming climate change and nutrition crisis, according to Dr. Kalibata, is pegged on how quickly and effectively adaptation plans are implemented, starting with financing.

“The annual adaptation costs in developing countries are estimated at $70 billion and African countries need to spend up to 9% of the cost of their GDP for adaptation programs…except now when coming out of COVID-19, many of them are suffering a huge debt burden, and are not investing as they should”…”It is really important that we continue thinking about how to increase our adaptation budgets and that countries come through on their promise on adaptation,” she said.

Her remarks further drew from the 2021 UN Food Systems Summit, which saw 49 African countries commit to transform their food systems through national pathways. As these countries start to unfold their pathways it is clear that sustainable and equitable food systems strategies will have to be anchored in climate adaptation. 

“It is important that we follow up quickly and ensure that these countries come up with plans that translate pathways into priorities on food security, resilience and adaptation and better nutrition”… It is important that we move from dialogues to investment plans and flagships that give opportunities to countries to focus on attention on the type of investments they need to end hunger, improve resilience and better nutrition,” she said. 

Dr. Kalibata used the opportunity to invite key food system stakeholders to the AGRF Summit in Kigali, Rwanda, from September 5 – 9, where she noted that more deliberations will be made on how to fast-track Africa’s adaptation and nutrition transformation agenda.

“AGRF partners will be showcasing the first three or four countries that have prepared investment plans… my call is that we work together to support these countries efforts” she said.

“We must continue to work on coming through together; there is no part of the world that can survive this alone; we need to ensure that the communities that are most exposed to climate change, that are suffering from nutrition and lack of resilience can have a better life for their children, which can only happen if we come through on the adaptation promises made to date.” she added.

The session was moderated by AGRA’s Vice-president of Program, Innovation and Delivery, Aggie Konde, and had a keynote address from Cristina Duarte, the Special Adviser on Africa to the United Nations Secretary-General. Other speakers were Dr. Godfrey Bahiigwa, the Director of Agriculture and Rural Development at the African Union Commission; Lawrence Haddad, the Executive Director of the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition; Robert Bertram, a director at USAID’s Office of Agriculture, Research and Technology; Dr. Bekele Shiferaw, the Lead Development Economist at the World Bank, and ILRI’s General Director, Dr. Jimmy Smith.

The disruptions on food systems caused by the COVID-19 and the current Russia-Ukraine crisis are just some of the latest issues that have brought to the fore discussions on the role of Strategic Food Reserves (SFR) in Africa. 

With support from AGRA’s Hub for Agricultural Policy Action (HAPA), a team from Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development held a tour from 16 to 20 May 2022, to study Kenya’s storage infrastructure, management models for public-private-partnership, institutional design, social safety nets, price stabilization mechanisms, and appropriate SFR stocks levels.

The tour is part of Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development request for AGRA Technical Assistance  as the country seeks to build up grain reserves and develop strategic food stocks for timely response in times of food security crisis. The support aims specifically to assist Nigeria in determining optimal stock levels for the country’s SGR, to assess the existing storage infrastructure capacity and to develop partnership models with the private sector.

The Nigerian team was drawn from the country’s Food and Strategic Reserves Department and was led by the Agriculture Permanent Secretary Dr. Enerst Umakhihe.

After a meeting with AGRA President Dr. Agnes Kalibata on the first day of the tour, the team’s schedule included meetings and tours with various government and private facilities, including the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Co-operatives, National Cereals and Produce Board (NCPB), the Warehouse Receipt System Council and the East African Grain Council (EAGC).

According to the Dr. Umakhihe, maize and sorghum have been the main crops under the strategic grains reserve in Nigeria, with budgetary constraints and fluctuations in prices of commodities being the main challenges to optimum reserves.  One of the team’s key interests in the tour was the running of the Warehouse Receipt System (WRS), which Kenya has been running for the last two years.  Nigeria intends to establish a WRS as it reforms its SFR strategy.

AGRA, in partnership with the Eastern Africa Grain Council, supported Kenya’s Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Co-operatives to develop regulations and other institutional frameworks to make the WRS operational in Kenya. 

Briefing the visiting team, WRS Council Board member Ms. Rose Mutuku said that the Council has already certified five National Cereal and Produce Board warehouses in Kitale, Eldoret, Nakuru, Nairobi and Meru.   

In these certified warehouses, farmers or traders are depositing commodities and are issued with a Warehouse Receipt which is then registered by the Council.  The depositor may use the receipt to trade with other buyers, finance institutions or input suppliers.

Apart from reducing post-harvest losses which currently stand at about 30%, the WRS is enabling small scale farmers to participate in a modern and efficient market with standard quality and weights.  The system is also creating flexibility, as farmers can plan to sell their commodities when the prices are favourable.  As a commodity exchange system, it will also play the role of stabilizing prices.

AGRA and other players supported the establishment of the WRS to counter challenges such as incidents where maize was bought at above market prices and sold at lower than market prices, undermining market functioning and pushing out private sector participation. 

The support included the establishment of a Food Balance Sheet Committee at the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Co-operatives which currently determines the price and quantities of food commodities for price stabilization. Apart from Kenya, AGRA is also supporting the development of Food Balance Sheet initiatives in Burundi, Malawi, Zambia and Mozambique.

At the briefing by the National Cereals and Produce Board with Managing Director Joseph Kimote, the Nigerian team was informed that Kenya’s food reserves is being restructured to constitute physical stock of food commodities or their cash equivalent, based on a three-month country population maize requirement.  For emergencies, the food reserve targets 10 percent of the population and about 26 percent of the chronically food insecure Kenyans.

The Board currently operates a network of 110 storage facilities which together have a storage capacity of 1,841,467 metric tonnes.  With the WRS system rolling out, NCPB is gradually leasing out the storage facilities to the private sector, with about a quarter of the capacity now being used by private entities.

East African Grain Council Chief Executive Officer Mr. Gerald Masila said that the private sector has worked closely with the government in the roll-out of the Warehouse Receipt System to ensure incentives for the commercial sector. 

He said that apart from policy advocacy, the Council supports farmers with information services such as the newly-launched Climate Information for Grains tool.  The council also runs the Grain Business Institute, its training division that addresses knowledge gaps in Eastern Africa’s grain sectors.

In her remarks at the conclusion of the study tour, Dr. Kalibata called for greater information exchange among countries, saying that African countries face similar food security challenges and exchange of experiences and lessons is prudent use of resources.

“It does not make sense for individual countries to struggle to figure out what others already have answers to,” she said.

Dr. Umakhihe said that the study tour had given the team important insights, including identifying some gaps in the National Food Reserve Agency (NFRA) Bill that is due to be discussed in the Federal Republic of Nigeria’s parliament.

As part of the objectives of its Regional Food Trade and Resilience programme, AGRA’s support for target countries’ SFR policies aims to ensure that they are not designed or implemented in ways that avoid negative ripple effects on private sector investment and participation of small farmers in markets. The Hub for Agricultural Policy Action is working in Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Mali, Nigeria, Ghana, Togo, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Ethiopia, Malawi, Mozambique, and Zambia to increase the use of evidence to inform decisions during implementation of such policies.

Authors: Boaz B. Keizire and Elizabeth Mwaniki – Policy and Advocacy Unit, AGRA

Rains have fallen short for the third time in a row in Mbeere South in Embu County, Kenya. Smallholder farmers are staring at drought and consequent food insecurity. Using early warning systems, scientists warned that the anticipated long rains will be below average, therefore inadequate to grow crops to maturity. Most crops withered in the farms, eroding farmers’ hopes of harvest and means of sustaining livelihoods.

According to the National Drought Management Authority (NDMA), Seven of the 23 Arid and Semi-Arid lands (ASAL) counties (Marsabit, Mandera, Wajir, Samburu, Isiolo, Baringo and Turkana) remain in Alarm drought phase while nine including Garissa, Kilifi, Kitui, Kwale, Laikipia, Lamu, Meru (North), Nyeri (Kieni) and West Pokot are in Alert drought phase. The remaining seven counties (Kajiado, Narok, Makueni, Taita Taveta, Tharaka Nithi and Embu (Mbeere) and Tana River) are in normal drought phase.

While initiatives are already in place to support the communities that are affected by drought, there is need for development of strategies that provide long term solutions for the affected counties.
The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) reports that severe drought affects Africa more than any other continent, with more than 300 events recorded in the past 100 years, accounting for 44 percent of the global total.

On the 17^th of June every year, we mark the International Day Against Desertification and Drought. This year’s theme is “Rising up from drought together”, highlighting the need of an early action to avoid disastrous consequences for humanity and ecosystems. Everyone can participate in actions that increase the world’s collective resilience.

Why Policy?

Drought preparedness polices make a difference: This year’s theme, recommends that proactive measures to reduce risks and increase resilience of ecosystems and communitiescan be achieved through sustainable land management and ecosystem restoration policies. “A strong and deliberate policy has never failed to respond to any challenge, including drought” said Boaz B. Keizire, Head of Policy and Advocacy at AGRA during the discussions on the implications of drought in Africa.

To this end, AGRA is building on the 2021 United Nations Food Systems Summit to identify policy gaps in African countries, with an objective of driving enabling policy making processes and implementation.  During the deliberations by Heads of state, they identified food security and state capability policies as top priorities for African countries.

One of the actions identified by Kenya during the Food Systems Summit discussions is to advance equitable livelihoods by fostering a culture of entrepreneurship, facilitating a shift from predominantly subsistence farming mentality to a more profitable agriculture outlook. This will be achieved via commercialization of agriculture, ensuring access to markets through organized cooperatives and out grower groups, value addition, and harnessing the power of mobile technologies.

Initially, the Government of Kenya implemented guidelines on subsidized inputs such as fertilizers and seeds supporting over 200, 000 farmers. This year, subsidized fertilizers and seeds have cushioned farmers from high input prices of commodities precedented by inflation following economic impacts of COVID-19 and ongoing inflation. However, inadequate rains have led to marginal harvests in some of the counties.

To cushion farmers from the effects of climate and economic downturn, the Government needs to emphasize on wider participation of agriculture insurance for small holder farmers covering crops, livestock and fisheries.

Agriculture was part of Climate Change COP26 deliberations in Glasgow where twenty-six nations set out new commitments to change their agricultural policies to become more sustainable and less polluting, and to invest in the science needed for sustainable agriculture and for protecting food supplies against climate change, laid out in two ‘Action Agendas’.  Kenya was a participant at COP26 in Glasgow. While addressing the world at Glasgow, Kenya’s President, H.E Uhuru Kenyatta, said that Kenya has developed a plan to maintain low carbon development trajectory by 2030.

The President also announced Kenya’s plan to work with other African countries that form the ‘Giants Club’ conservation group to raise resources for investment in the continent’s climate change mitigation programmes. As the momentum is building for COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Kenya should adopt the Policy Action Agenda for the Transition to Sustainable Agriculture and prepare for the discussion on adaptation and loss of damage that will be on COP27 agenda. This could be achieved through support from AGRA’s Partnership for Inclusive Agricultural Transformation in Africa (PIATA).

Recently, the Government launched the Agricultural Sector Institutional Capacity strengthening plan (ICSP) that was developed with the support of AGRA. The plan aims at boosting agricultural productivity and improving livelihoods by addressing systemic obstacles constraining Kenya’s ability to achieve food and nutrition security.

• AGRA and Microsoft, through its Africa Transformation Office, signed an MoU for further partnership in Davos
• The organizations will leverage their success from a previous partnership starting 2019, and which led to the development of the AgriBot

DAVOS, Switzerland:  May 24, 2022 – AGRA and leading technology provider Microsoft, have announced expanding their partnership to advance digital agricultural transformation in Africa.

The partnership, formalized through a Memorandum of Understanding on the margins of the World Economic Forum in Davos 2022, builds on previous work between AGRA and Microsoft that focused on supporting AGRA’s digital transformation as it works to improve food security in Africa.

The new phase of the relationship will promote digital innovation and technology as an enabler to connect the agriculture ecosystems, sustainably integrating stakeholders in the service of strategic value chains.

“At AGRA, we realized early on that digital innovation is critical in advancing food security and poverty eradication in Africa. Our partnership with Microsoft will directly support governments, SMEs and farmers, by bringing the digital tools needed to build resilient food systems.” said AGRA President, Dr. Agnes Kalibata.

“I am delighted that Microsoft is expanding its partnership with The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa,” said Jean-Philippe Courtois, Executive Vice-President and President, National Transformation Partnerships, Microsoft. “Helping to deliver against the UNSDG of Zero Hunger by improving food security for millions of households, is vital for a fairer and more sustainable global economy. Digitalization is key to scaling impact and driving positive change.”

The announcement follows initial collaboration between the two organizations starting 2019, when Microsoft and AGRA co-created the AgriBot as a digital solution for localized extension and advisory services for smallholder farmers. The AgriBot works through inclusive omni-channel application experiences like Short Message Service (SMS) and WhatsApp for prioritized value chains.

“Our partnership with AGRA forms part of Microsoft’s ongoing investment in agritech across the continent as we support digital transformation in the sector. We’re excited to continue building locally relevant technology solutions that address the local farmers’ needs and deliver meaningful impact,” said Angela Kyerematen-Jimoh, Strategic Partnership Lead, Microsoft Africa Transformation Office.

In extending their relationship, the two organizations will:

• Leverage the Microsoft programs and tools to aggregate and enrich the various SME programs within AGRA;
• leverage the Tech for Social Impact team to support AGRA in its digital transformation journey;
• launch the third phase of the AgriBot to develop a sustainability model of the platform through exploring partnerships with third parties, in addition to scaling out to all the counties that have the VBA program;
• develop partnerships with other private sector companies like Bayer, Yara, Syngenta, Nestle, Rabobank, OLAM and others to get a broad-based buy in and explore opportunities for sustainable agriculture and explore use cases like digital value chain integration, smart agriculture, water conservation, traceability, and carbon sequestration, and
• empower youth for agriculture transformation by leveraging Microsoft skilling programs and tools like Microsoft Community Training (MCT) to scale AGRA programs on agribusiness, entrepreneurship, and employability.

Microsoft and AGRA are further partnering with Kenya’s Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Cooperatives (MoALFC) to significantly accelerate the transformation of the agriculture ecosystem in line with the Agricultural Sector Transformation and Growth Strategy (ASTGS) for digitisation.

The collaboration will explore the use of AgriBot as an e-extension solution to compliment the MoALFC e-voucher system thereby taking digital solutions to the last mile, where farmers realize the most benefits.

Originally posted on news.microsoft.com