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Partnership News Brief: Week of March 15, 2010

 
COMESA Signs Agreement with ACTESA
Source: ACTESA March 2010 Newsletter
Lusaka, Zambia - 2 March 2010
 
Click Here to download the PDF Version of ACTESA's Newsletter with the full story!
 
 
The UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Prof. Olivier De Schutter, presents on March 5th in Geneva his report on ‘Agribusiness and the right to food’.
Source: UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food
Geneva, Switzerland - 18 March 2010
 
Issues related to global food chains and the role of private agribusiness actors in global food security have insufficiently been addressed since the 2008 global food crisis. The report examines the role of commodity buyers, food processors and retailers in the realization of the right to food. These actors play a key role, as they connect producers to consumers, and as they transform raw commodities into edible food. But the vast majority of those who are hungry in the world today are part of the food system; small independent food producers or waged agricultural workers working on farms in the formal or informal sector represent over half of the billion who go hungry today. The report therefore asks how the sourcing, pricing, and wages policies of commodity buyers, food processors and retailers impact the right to food.
 
The report seeks to contribute to a better understanding, by agribusiness corporations and States alike, of their respective responsibilities and obligations under international law. It ends with recommendations to States and the agribusiness sector to ensure that the current transformation of the food chain will contribute to the realization of the right to food. The recommendations relate to a range of areas, including competition law, international framework agreements, cooperatives, and public procurement.
 
Read the report 'Agribusiness and the right to food' and its summary.
 
Read the press release 'The imbalance of power between smallholders and agribusiness must be corrected'.
 
Watch the video presentation.
 
 
Japan, Brazil to Help Mozambique Develop Soybean, Other Crop Production
Source: Japan Economic Newswire
Tokyo, Japan - 17 March 2010
 
Japan and Brazil will jointly provide support for agricultural development in Mozambique to help ease the problem of poverty in the southern African country, people familiar with the project said Thursday.
 
The support will focus on Mozambique's vast tropical savanna, utilizing experiences from a project that has successfully converted Brazil's "cerrado" tropical savanna ecoregion into one of the world's major food-producing areas thanks to cultivar improvement and other agricultural technologies from Japan, they said.

Mozambique's tropical savanna is as wide as 550,000 square kilometers, or 1.4 times larger than Japan's land area, and has soil and weather conditions similar to those of Brazil's cerrado, or "inaccessible," region.

When the United States banned soybean exports in the 1970s, Japan financially and technologically helped Brazil develop the cerrado for agriculture in a bid to stabilize the supply of soybeans. As a result, Brazil has become a major soybean exporter along with the United States.

Under the joint aid program, Brazil will primarily provide Mozambique with agricultural technologies, while Japan will support infrastructure improvements such as building a 350-kilometer trunk road that will cut across the tropical savanna.

Japan signed an agreement with Mozambique on Wednesday to extend up to 5,978 million yen in a low-interest, long-term loan for the infrastructure improvement project.

Mozambique is one of the world's poorest nations, with per capita gross domestic product amounting to $477, due to delays in adoption of advanced foreign technologies and infrastructure improvements for agriculture that involves some 80 percent of its labor force.

The joint Japan-Brazil support program, which will cover such products as soybeans, wheat, tomatoes and pumpkins, will not only improve the productivity of both small- and large-scale farming operations but also introduce foreign capital to processing operations, a Japan International Cooperation Agency official said.

 
 
Embrace Modernized Farming Techniques, UN Tells Africa
Source: allAfrica.com
Lagos, Nigeria - 15 March 2010
 
In order for Africa to be liberated from hunger and unemployment among its youths, the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) recently advised the continent to embrace modern method of farming.
 
Director-General of UNIDO, Dr. Kandeh Yumkella, said this at the High Level Conference on Development of Agribusiness and Agro-industries in Africa which ended in Abuja recently.
 
According to him, we are doing Agribusiness the same way our ancestors were doing it 2000 years ago, this 21st century for us to meet up with the current situation there is need for us to embrace modern method of farming as to address unemployment problem in the Africa continent.
 

This is as the Acting President Goodluck Jonathan said Federal Government has injected about N542 billion to the development of Agriculture in the country.

Part of which N240 billion was injected to commercial agriculture especially in the area of production, processing, storage and market infrastructure development over the next three years, while Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) doled out 200 billion for some selected banks , also another 100 billion was injected into development of Nigeria's Cotton-Textile-Garment.

 
The Acting President, who agreed that Nigerian agricultural sector has suffered from being dominated by ageing farming, said the federal government of Nigeria has set in a motion a major milestone in Nigeria agricultural development programme.
 
In his words," in addressing the existing of shortcoming in the agriculture sector of the economy , the commercial Agriculture Development Programme (CADP) of the federal government of Nigeria as part of the National Programme for Agriculture and Food Security (NPAFS) has set motion in major milestone in Nigeria agricultural development programme. The overall objective of the programme is to contribute to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and objective of the country of 7- point agenda and vision 20:2020 development strategies, by addressing Nigeria's challenges of the critical infrastructure."
 
He assured the stakeholders that the incumbent administration has deliberately formulated a policy framework to encourage Public Private Partnership (PPP) in the commercial agriculture facilitated by the development of the relevant infrastructure, human and availability of unencumbered land to site the various projects.
 
In the presentation of UN Economic Commission for Africa(ECA) the representative of the Commission Economic Commission for Africa, Mr. Abdoulie Janneh, said UNECA has embarked in the advocacy of the development of the regional value chains for selected strategic agricultural commodities that were defined at the AU summit held in Abuja December 2006.
 
He also said the commission convicted that most Africa's annual food import bill of $33billion can be diverted to domestic production for regional and global trade , thereby contributing to reducing poverty and hunger and reposition the continent in the global economy, adding that this can be done provided that African farmers are increasingly connected to agricultural input and product market through vibrant agro-industrial and agribusiness sector.
In the same development, the minister of Agriculture and Water Resources, Dr. Sayyadi Ruma said while brief the newsmen after the event that no fewer than 20 Agro-industrial business will start in month time in other to energize agricultural sector of the economy,
 
He also said that the Federal Government will set up implementation committee in order to implement Abuja Declaration insisting that everything adopted at the event will be implemented by the country.
 
The programme which lasted for three days was attended by 40 African countries and 40 minister across the continent, the Prime Minister of Tanzania and Serria Lone President were in attendance with the Acting President Goodluck Jonathan .
 
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Research into Business: Comercializing Agricultural Research and Technologies
Source: AECF
16 March 2010
 
In our last newsletter we introduced the AECF Zimbabwe window, the second of our special, targeted competitions. We are delighted to announce that we are following this with the “Research Into Business” (RIB) window. RIB is open for business opportunities throughout Africa and to both African and International applicants. RIB will not fund primary research itself but will consider any idea which aims to turn existing (or near complete) agricultural Research Into a profitable Business.

We are calling for proposals that combine profitability with developmental and social impact. Through the provision of grant and repayable grant funding, the AECF RIB window seeks to promote risk-taking and innovation to encourage established businesses to extend their core activities in ways that create opportunities for the rural poor.

We envisage four broad groups of possible business ideas and applications for funding:
  • Partnerships between agribusinesses and agricultural research institutions, international and local. The lead applicant must be from the private sector but may, if appropriate, request funding to meet partner ARIs’ costs in implementing the proposal.
  • Agribusinesses proposing to commercialize research and/or technologies already in the public domain and able to identify and acknowledge the source.
  • Agribusinesses proposing to commercialize the results of their own R&D investment.
  • Business ideas in the information and media services sector that relate to knowledge and technology transfer between researchers and farmers/agribusinesses.
 
If you have an idea that does not fall easily into one of these four groups and, yet, is clearly based on the results of existing agricultural research, we would still encourage you to apply.

The AECF offers to co-fund your business plan, with between US$250,000, and US$1.5 million. You must plan to invest at least the same amount from your own resources, in cash or kind but not counting land and fixed assets. You will have to complete an online application, or concept note, outlining your company, your business idea, its basis in agricultural research and how it will benefit the rural poor. The application is easy to fill in and has been set up so that you can edit, change or modify your concept at any time over the whole period that the competition is open.

We launched the RIB window on 1 March 2010 and the first round of the competition will stay open until May 17th. All complete applications will be marked by a team of assessors and the best will be asked to submit a more detailed business plan before the AECF’s Investment Committee decides on the winners.

The Virtual Market Place - VMP

The VMP (Virtual Market Place) is a web based portal where research institutions showcase technologies they have available that are ready for uptake by the private sector. Private sector companies use the VMP to access ideas, contacts and further information from researchers about profitable technologies available for African agriculture. Ideas and business plans brokered through the VMP can access financial resources from the Research Into Business Window.

Please visit our website (www.aecfafrica.org ) to view the VMP, find out more about RIB or to apply for funding

 
The Zimbabwe Window
 
The AECF’s first competition to focus on a single country, the AECF Zimbabwe Window, was launched on 10 December 2009 and closed on 31 January 2010. We received 374 complete applications - significantly exceeding our expectations - of which 211 were eligible. Three teams of assessors identified 42 of these as the best according to the assessment criteria for this competition.

“The AECF ZW received just short of 600 registrations on their website from interested businesses and over 200 eligible initial applications, many of which were of good quality” reported Mr. Corin Mitchell, the Southern Africa Manager of the AECF.

The AECF’s independent Investment Committee met on 25th and 26th of February in Harare and decided that 20 of these have the highest chance of achieving widespread development impact on the livelihoods of the rural poor in Zimbabwe. 16 agribusiness and four rural financial services projects will now prepare detailed business plans, with assistance from the AECF team. The Investment Committee makes its final selection in May.

“What is strikingly clear...” said AECF Director Mr. Hugh Scott “is that we have received far more high quality applications than our initial funding for this window can provide for”.

The AECF ZW has an initial funding window of approximately US$4.2m, provided by the Australian Government’s Development Agency, AusAID. With the results and quality of initial applications received, it is envisaged that other development partners will join AusAID, enabling a second round of competition to be run later in 2010, and more high quality business ideas to be funded.

Both Mr. Scott and Mr. Mitchell believe that there is an opportunity for the AECF ZW to fund a critical number of high quality business ideas in parts of the agribusiness and financial services sectors to stimulate these markets, positively impact on market systems and in so doing, impact on the incomes of rural Zimbabweans.

 
 
 
Book Release: Cash on Delivery: A New Approach to Foreign Aid
Nancy Birdsall and William D. Savedoff
16 March 2010
 
Foreign aid has no shortage of critics. Some argue that it undermines development and inherently does more harm than good; others insist that aid must be seriously reformed to work properly. Cash on Delivery (COD) Aid proposes serious reform to make aid work well by forcing accountability, aligning the objectives of funders and recipients, and sharing information about what works.
 
Public and private aid can improve lives in poor countries, but the willingness of taxpayers and private funders to finance aid programs depends more than ever on showing results. COD Aid is a funding mechanism that hinges on results. At its core is a contract between funders and recipients that stipulates a fixed payment for each unit of confirmed progress toward an agreed-upon goal. Once the contract is struck, the funder takes a hands-off approach, allowing the recipient the freedom and responsibility to achieve the goal on its own. Payment is made only after progress toward the goal is independently verified by a third party. At all steps, a COD Aid program is remarkably transparent: the contract, the amount of progress made, and the payment are disseminated publicly to highlight the credibility of the arrangement and improve accountability to the public. COD Aid is a new approach to foreign aid, but one that complements other aid programs and would ultimately encourage funders and recipients to use existing resources more efficiently.
 
Cash On Delivery Aid: A New Approach to Foreign Aid explains the approach in detail and investigates its application in one sector: education. More specifically, the authors show how foreign aid agencies could use COD Aid to help developing countries achieve universal primary school education. The example illustrates how to deal with potential challenges of the approach—challenges that are no greater than those of traditional aid—and includes model term sheets for contracts that could be used for any COD Aid agreement.
 
For Sample Chapters Please Click Here
 
 
 

Announcements

 

Ending World Hunger: What Can the US Do?

Wilson Center Event on the Hill

 
The World Health Organization estimates that one-third of the world is well- fed, one-third is under-fed, and one-third is starving. The USDA coordinator of the Obama Administration’s food security initiative and a leading expert on Africa will discuss the factors that contribute to the global food crisis and how the U.S. and the world can address the key issues. A key congressional will provide an update on food security legislation.
 
Speakers:
 
Jay Branegan
Senior Professional Staff, Senate Committee on Foreign Relations
 
Julie Howard
Executive Director, Partnership to Cut Hunger and Poverty in Africa
 
Ann Tutwiler
Coordinator for Food Security Initiative, USDA
 
Moderator:
 
John Sewell
Senior Scholar, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
 
Date: Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Time: 12:00 - 1:15
Venue: B-338 Rayburn House Office Building
 
 
Congressional Hearing: Subcommittee on Africa and Global Affairs: An Overview of US Policy in Africa
Donald M. Payne (D-NJ), Chairman
 
You are respectfully requested to attend an OPEN hearing of the Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health, to be held on March 24 in Room 2172 of the Rayburn House Office Building (and available live, via the WEBCAST link on the Committee website www.hcfa.house.gov.
 
Date: Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Time: 3:30 PM
Location: RHOB Room 2172
 
Panel I:
 
The Honorable Johnnie Carson
Assistant Secretary
Bureau of African Affairs
United States Department of State
 
Mr. Earl Gast
Senior Deputy Assistant Administrator
Bureau for Africa
U.S. Agency for International Development
 
Panel II:
 
The Honorable Princeton N. Lyman
Adjunct Senior Fellow for African Policy Studies
Council on Foreign Relations
(Former United States Ambassador to South Africa and Nigeria)
 
Mr. Almami Cyllah
Regional Director for Africa
International Foundation for Electoral Systems
 
 
Job Opportunity: USAID Rwanda Agriculture Advisor
 
Description:
The Senior Agriculture Advisor will serve as the technical and policy advisor for USAID/Rwanda’s agricultural development programs and projects within the Economic Growth (EG) program and lead implementation of the GHFSI in Rwanda.  Specifically, the Advisor will provide technical leadership in planning, developing, budgeting, implementing, managing, and monitoring the USAID/Rwanda’s expanding program to foster food security in Rwanda.  This program is comprised of several projects that promote increased agriculture productivity, expanded markets and trade, improved economic opportunities for Rwanda’s very poor, enhanced regional integration, and strengthened agricultural research.  The incumbent facilitates and maintains technical discussions with the Government of Rwanda (GOR), the Rwandan private sector, non-governmental organizations (NGO), other U.S. Government (USG) agencies, multilateral donors, and implementing partners.  S/he is expected to be entrepreneurial, resourceful, and innovative to identify and conceptualize promising initiatives and leverage USG, GOR, and other donor funds.  S/he provides technical leadership within the existing USAID/Rwanda EG Team of six American and Rwandan staff.  The team is expected to grow by perhaps 50% in the coming year.  The incumbent may be expected to directly supervise up to four local professional staff.
 
For More Information on this Position
and for Information on How to Apply please Click Here.
 
 
 

 

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