The first Agricultural Industry Forum (AIF) and exhibition was officially opened on March 3, 2020, at the Nairobi Hospital Convention Centre. The forum called on designing and incorporating more innovative technologies and increased investment by the private sector stakeholders in the agribusiness sector.
The conference main aim was to provide a national platform for discussions on how best to strengthen and sustain effective partnerships in the agricultural sector in the context of devolution.
Speaking at the opening of the Forum, Israel Ambassador to Kenya, H.E Oded Joseph stated that they will continue to partner with Kenya in undertaking agricultural activities. “Israel being a world leader in the field of agriculture, it will continue to be a significant partner in creating capacity-building opportunities between the two countries.”
He added that in order for an economy to be sustainable and economically viable, the business sector has to play a vital role, the youth have to be involved and basic infrastructures have to be set up to support the agriculture sector.
During the forum, the Chairman of Agricultural Industry Network, Mr. Edward Mudibo called on fast-tracking of the national agricultural policy, which revolves around the main objectives of increasing productivity and income growth, especially for smallholders; enhanced food security and equity, emphasis on irrigation to introduce stability in agricultural output, commercialization and intensification of production, especially among small scale farmers.
Mr. Mudibo noted that platforms, where the private sector, national and county government can activate new strategic partnerships, need to be created for transformational change within the Kenyan agribusiness sector. He also highlighted that governance and the role of cooperatives need to be rethought.
The other key message that came out of the forum was the need to make agriculture attractive to the youth so as to reduce the unemployment crisis. There was the need to develop guidelines for public-private partnerships(PPPs) between county government and the private sector, and actionable strategies to improve the agribusiness sector.
Moreover, the government will establish six agro-processing units within each economic bloc across the country. The units will be developed using a one-stop-shop rapid Public-Private Partnership(PPP) process for local and export markets.
The central theme of the forum is “Rethinking Agribusiness: Enhancing Effectiveness in Public-Private Partnerships,” which will provide a platform for agribusiness leaders and other value chain actors to engage with national and county-level policymakers, academia and other key stakeholders to review the current business operating environment within the context of devolution. It will seek to unlock the bottlenecks facing the private sector and other agriculture industry players when engaging with national and county governments. The Forum is expected to attract more than 500 delegates and 50 exhibitors from across the agriculture sector.
Dr. Hannington Odame, the APRA Regional Research and Engagement Coordinator (RREC) for Eastern Africa has been participating in the Forum’s Programme Committee, enabling APRA to provide support to the Forum. The APRA team will also prepare framing notes, make presentations, moderate specific sessions and Offer the benefit of their knowledge and experience to attendees.
An outline of the program for the event can be viewed on the Agriculture Industry Forum website here
On January 31, the Centre for African Bio-Entrepreneurship signed a partnership agreement with Agricycle East Africa Limited to empower smallholder farmers, women, and youth by creating market linkages for value-added fruits.
Agricycle East Africa Ltd is a social enterprise subsidiary of Agricycle Global specializing in fruit processing and marketing to create sustainable business relations for women empowerment.
The three-year agreement entails designing projects, resource mobilization, and creating collaborative platforms for learning and knowledge exchange on fruit agribusiness, women empowerment, deployment of technologies and equipment for fruit drying and capacity building.
Speaking at the signing ceremony, the Executive Director CABE, Dr. Hannigton Odame said “This MoU complements CABE’s activities in facilitating market linkages, capacity building and training, research, and policy processes. On the other hand, it allows Agricycle East Africa to partner with CABE-affiliated farmer groups to alleviate poverty through agri-preneurship and provide food safety and health standards in fruit processing and marketing activities.”
After signing the MoU, the two organizations will develop an implementation strategy alongside a resource mobilization strategy. In the first phase, the partners will engage farmer groups in Western Kenya and eventually scale-out in other counties, which produce plenty of fruits but have inadequate market linkages.
“We will now move to create an action plan for the first year of the MoU implementation and develop Standard Operating Procedures in efforts to mobilize resources and provide technical and social activities from each organization,” Agricycle East African Director, Mr. Patrick Nderitu stated.
Also, the two organizations will invest in women and youth empowerment to build their agribusiness skills, provide access to market linkages and access to agri-financing.
The Centre for African Bio-Entrepreneurship (CABE) successfully hosted the APRA Annual Review and Planning Workshop in Naivasha from 2-6 December 2019. Members of the three APRA workstreams and APRA Consortium, stationed at the Institute of Development Studies (IDS), also participated.
The theme of this year’s workshop was Impact, Communications, and Engagement (ICE). It aimed at reviewing tactics and strategies for communicating policy-relevant insights and evidence ‘nuggets’ emerging from the APRA studies to key stakeholders and clarifying pathways to impact.
During the workshop, the Accompanied Learning for Relevance and Effectiveness (ALRE) initiative was officially launched, which aims to improve engagement efforts, trace influence, and identify lessons for improving future programming within APRA.
Highlights from the workshop include: review of progress on APRA research activities during the year related to Work Stream 1 (panel studies), Work Stream 2 (longitudinal studies) and Work Stream 3 (policy studies). Presentation of policy-relevant insights evidence from the Work Stream studies related to the APRA Outcome Indicators and cross-cutting themes; clarification of engagement priorities and plans from the Participatory Impact Pathways Analysis (PIPA) and Theory of Change (ToC) workshops to bring about outcome-level change, and discussions on hosting APRA phase 2.
It was noted that there are high levels of commercialisation of oil palm in South-Western Ghana due to specialisation and highly stratified oil palm economy by gender, generation, and class.
Comparing food-based versus tobacco-led agricultural commercialisation in Zimbabwe, Vine Mutyasira observed that tobacco-led commercialisation resulted in higher returns leading to whole-farm productivity-enhancing investments in technologies, livestock, and assets.
In the case of long-term change in cocoa commercialisation in Ghana, Joseph Yaro mentioned that the private and state sector investment can boost access to technical innovation for intensification of production thus improved incomes for cocoa farmers.
From the longitudinal analysis of sunflower commercialisation in Singida, Tanzania, Christopher Magomba highlighted that the sustainability of sunflower commercialisation and productivity has led to low uptake of inputs such as fertiliser and seeds, low purchasing power; limited access to extension services leading to low yields and competition from alternative annual crops (maize, green gram).
Rice commercialisation has ensured household and the community food security and considerable change in the livelihood options for smallholder rice farmers in the Fogera plains of Ethiopia. This change contributed to rise in rice processors from 1 in 1997 to 123 in 2018, increased employment opportunities especially for casual labourers and interdependence of rice production and labour markets and 93% of the processors became rice sole proprietors recording average value of 360 thousand birr/processor. Whereas in Tanzania, intensification was mentioned as a solution to small and medium-scale farmers in rice commercialisation.
Speaking on the political economy of growth corridors and agricultural commercialisation, Ngala Chome, a PhD candidate, said, “There are diverse pathways to commercialisation along the growth corridors and they range from the establishment of estates/plantation to the creation of block farms and cooperative groups, to contract farming arrangements, which emerge through infrastructure development.” He added that ethnic politics play a critical role, as claims over resources are contested between indigenous groups and the state.
Presenting on behalf of Jodie and Seife, John Thompson mentioned that good incentives (e.g. financial guarantees) can increase the role of small to mid-sized enterprise (SME) agribusinesses in commercialisation pathways rather than policy uptake.
In order to empower the youth, the emphasis was placed on providing more programs or schooling to millions of young people in order to reduce rural-urban migration, the former highlighted in this Ghana-based youth engagement blog.
Looking ahead to Phase 2, DFID’s Howard Standen advised the team to be persistent and use personal relationships or existing champions, such as the African Union Commission, Advisory person, Department of Rural Economy and Agriculture, African Union Commission. Ethiopia, Dr. Janet Edeme and the ‘to push for regional and national debates contribution in agricultural commercialisation.
A heavy downpour expected to strike the entire country this week has been attributed to the unusual warming of the Indian Ocean.
The phenomenon, called the Indian Ocean Dipole, happens nearly every 10 years, unleashing destructive rains and flooding across East Africa.
More than one million people have been displaced in Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Ethiopia, and Tanzania – but scientists say more misery is coming.
Kenya’s Meteorological Department yesterday warned that beginning today a heavy deluge will sweep across the country.
Assistant Director of KMD Dr. David Gikungu had yesterday predicted the rains would begin last night, doubling in intensity tomorrow.
“The rainfall is expected to intensify to more than 40 millimeters in 24 hours from Thursday 21 to Sunday, November 24, 2019,” he said in a statement.
The warm weather and heavy rains are favorable for many crops. Weary tea farmers in central Kenya are currently sleeping in buying centers waiting for already strained factories to accept their bumper harvests for processing.
Yesterday, Dr. Gikungu put the entire country on alert, saying there was an up to 66 percent certainty more heavy rains are coming.
The Indian Ocean dipole, sometimes called the Indian El Niño, is an irregular change in the sea temperature in the western (near Kenya’s coast) and eastern (closer to Australia) areas of the Indian Ocean.
When the ocean around East Africa is far warmer than usual, there is higher evaporation and moist air flowing inwards into East African countries as heavy rains.
Scientists say this year the strength of the dipole is of a magnitude not seen in years, perhaps even decades.
“A strong positive Indian Ocean Dipole, which is currently +2.06 degrees, is quite favorable for enhanced rainfall in the country,” Met director Stella Aura said last month.
She predicted the current rainfall would continue until early December, with occasional dry breaks.
“Floodwaters may suddenly appear even in places where it has not rained heavily and can be deeper and faster than they look,” she said.
Aura also advised Kenyans to avoid driving through or walking in moving water or open fields and not take shelter under trees and near grilled windows to minimize exposure to lightning strikes.
She put on alert people in landslide‐prone areas, especially on the slopes of the Aberdare Ranges, Mt Kenya and other hilly areas in the western region.
Aura said that the ground is already saturated with water.
“This (rain) coupled with the already saturated grounds is likely to continue causing floods and landslides in affected parts of the country,” Aura said in a statement.
The IGAD Climate Prediction and Applications Centre, based at Dagoretti Corner, also said above-average rainfall was expected to persist until December. The positive dipole, it said, was “likely” responsible.
The last major positive dipole was in 2006 when more than 300 people were killed in region-wide flooding caused by unseasonal rains.
