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Showing posts with label Dr Ibrahim Mayaki. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dr Ibrahim Mayaki. Show all posts

Wednesday, April 13, 2016

Africa must collectively innovate to industrialise agriculture – CAADP CEO

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the NEPAD Agency, Dr Ibrahim Mayaki, has called on African stakeholders to collectively innovate so as to ensure necessary impacts are made in agriculture investment, reports NaijaAgroNet.

Speaking at the 12th Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Partnership Platform (CAADP PP) meeting convened by the African Union Commission in collaboration with the NEPAD Agency in Ghana, Dr. Mayaki Africa can only make progress if the actors collectively innovate and agree to account for the resources injected, results and impact that may ensue.

“Indeed, as a continent, with a community of destiny, we cannot afford to invest into our agriculture the same way we have been doing thus far,” he said

The meeting brought together over 300 participants.  High level African leadership included the former President of Ghana John Kufour; former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo and Dr Agnes Kalibata, President of Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa.  Also present were Regional Economic Communities, government ministries, farmers’ organisations, the private sector, civil society and development partners.  

In her opening remarks at the CAADP PP meeting, H.E Ms Tumusiime Rhoda Peace, Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture of the African Union Commission said, the only way to sustainably deliver on African agricultural commitments is to mobilize our own continental human and financial resources. “We need to build strong partnerships for an accountable and efficient implementation of the CAADP Agenda since investment in agriculture makes good economic sense,” she said.

The Ghanaian Deputy Minister for Food and Agriculture, Dr Ahmed Yakubu Alhassan declared that CAADP is the most ambitious agricultural reform agenda ever undertaken on the continent, as an African-led and owned development framework.  Innovative financing for agriculture in Africa is also critical for rural transformation.

In keeping with the theme of the meeting on Innovative Financing and Renewed Partnership to Accelerate Implementation of CAADP, Dr Mayaki reiterated that Africa must innovate because we need to design new and fit-for-purpose instruments that are able to help deal with the emerging trends, challenges and opportunities.

“The issue of Risk Management is a typical example of where we need to propose innovative instruments that meet the needs of the countries. The remedies and solutions of the past may not work with the ever more complex issues of today,” Dr Mayaki said.

Concurring with the fact that farmers are at the heart of transforming the agricultural sector, Philip Kiriro, President of the Eastern Africa Farmers Federation expressed satisfaction with the progress made in CAADP thus far.

Christoph Rauh, Deputy Director of BMZ, sub-Saharan Africa, stated that young people need to be involved, as agriculture needs to provide good business and employment for the youth.  “It is time to talk less and do more in order for results and impact to be achieved,” he said.

Agricultural transformation will be realised when industrialisation of the sector is finally achieved. This was the consensus from the different representatives.

It is expected that the 12th CAADP PP meeting will generate a number of key actionable activities to speed up implementation through financial innovation and partnerships to deliver the Malabo Declaration and the Africa Union “Agenda 2063” - a strategic framework for the socio-economic transformation of the continent over the next 50 years. 

+Remmy Nweke +Naija AgroNet
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Opinion: No option but to innovate for business of agriculture

Of all the challenges that Africa faces, there is one that transcends and embraces all the others: I mean agriculture. Our continent today runs the risk of missing a unique opportunity to develop and offer its youth the jobs it has the obligation to provide if it wants to avoid social implosion.
Agriculture, which employs or provides livelihoods to 60% of the population while contributing 20-30% to Africa’s GDP, is the sector that could by itself enable to save the greatest number of Africans from extreme poverty while giving them their dignity back.
And yet, it typically attracts less than 5% of lending from financial institutions on the continent, leaving farmers and agricultural enterprises starved of the capital they need to operate and grow their businesses.
The scope for growth is all the more important that the situation is highly paradoxical: Africa imports the equivalent of $ 50 billion of food every year. Yet more than half of the arable land unexploited in the world are on the continent!
The 12th CAADP PP taking place in Ghana this week is organised around the theme “Accelerating Implementation of CAADP through Innovative Financing and Renewed Partnership”. The theme reflects the urgency being placed on implementation by the African Union and its members.
To solve the agricultural equation, we must join forces and continue our efforts to define a common agricultural policy. In 2003, in Maputo, we really started to turn the corner in laying the foundations for pan-African agricultural initiatives. The Heads of State and Government of the African Union then decided to devote 10% of their national budgets to agriculture. In 2014, in Malabo, they reiterated their commitment to further increase investment, both public and private, in agriculture.
Innovative financing will be key in unlocking Africa’s Green Revolution. Innovative financing is a means of mobilizing additional resources for investment in agriculture or solving long-running market failures that can unlock private investment. Now we should aim at a growth model that is public-sector enabled, and private sector scaled.
Because of the rural and dispersed nature of agricultural production, where banks and formal financial institutions often lack a presence, mobile technology provides a convenient and low-cost distribution channel to reach farmers and agro-enterprises with electronic payments and information products, as well as savings, credit, and insurance products, among others. It can also help to transfer targeted financial support for small farmers and agribusiness.
Investments in infrastructure will also help drive increased private investment and production in the agriculture sector. Often resulting in public goods that benefit a broad base of economic activity, investments in irrigation, transport and market infrastructure in particular are critical to improving economic returns and productivity in the agriculture sector.
The next step is to put in place a system that ensures the prices and the flow (or storage) of production, combined with a system of variable levies at the external borders of Africa (taxes on imports) protecting productions potential competition from products from outside. This will require innovative financial mechanisms and technologies as well.
A proactive agricultural policy should be common because it requires us to share not only our resources, but also our minds and our wills. It should be common because it cannot be implemented without regional infrastructure, energy and logistics in particular, that will allow our farmers to compete and enter into a process of value creation. We should harness the latest innovations and technologies because Africa has no other option but to leapfrog if it wants to realize its tremendous potential.

*A contribution by Ibrahim Assane Mayaki is CEO of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD).
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