ROME,
Italy, April 30, 2021/ -- A coalition of multilateral development banks
and development partners has pledged over US$17 billion in financing on
Friday during a high-level forum, in a bold bid to address rising
hunger on the African continent and to improve food security.
These funds were pledged on the final day of a two-day high-level dialogue - Feeding Africa: leadership to scale up successful innovations. The
event was hosted by the Africa Development Bank and the UN
International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), in partnership
with the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) and the CGIAR
System Organization, on 29 and 30 April.
In addition, 17 African
heads of state signed on to the commitment to boost agricultural
production by doubling current productivity levels through the scaling
up of agro-technologies, investing in access to markets, and promoting
agricultural research and development.
The various parties adopted a communiqué outlining these commitments at the end of the event.
Of
the overall amount pledged, more than US$10 billion came from the
African Development Bank, which said it would invest US$1.57 billion on
scaling up 10 selected priority commodities over the next five years.
This will help countries achieve self-sufficiency. Another US$8.83
billion go towards building strong value chains for these commodities
over the next five years. This will include programmes to create
opportunities for young people – particularly women.
African
Development Bank President Dr. Akinwumi A. Adesina said: “Let us now
create today, a stronger partnership: a partnership for greater scale; a
partnership to take technologies and innovations to hundreds of
millions of farmers.”
IFAD said it aimed to provide an additional
US$1.5 billion to Africa to support national efforts to transform food
and agricultural systems over the next three years. IFAD will also
invest more in creating the pre-conditions for increased agricultural
productivity. The organization is helping to develop a growing pipeline
of investments to restore land, create jobs and build resilience to
climate change in the Sahel region. This will contribute to the Green
Great Wall objectives, and will create 10 million jobs in the region by
2030.
“We praise the African leaders’ commitment to increase
agricultural productivity and improve food security for millions of
Africans,” said IFAD President Gilbert F. Houngbo. “By modernizing
African agriculture, small-scale farmers will be in a better position to
bring more affordable food to consumers and create decent livelihoods
for millions of young Africans involved in the processing, storage and
marketing of food.”
The Arab Bank for Economic Development in
Africa (BADEA) committed up to US$1.5 billion over the period 2020-2024
in agriculture. The Islamic Development Bank Group said it would earmark
US$3.5 billion in developing the agriculture sector in Africa in the
next three years. It said these investments will develop commodity value
chains for both staple food and cash crops.
In an additional
show of solidarity, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, joining a
coalition of development partners, declared that it will invest US$652
million in the next three years. This will support agriculture research
and development initiatives in Africa. This funding is expected to
empower 300 million farmers with a host of new innovations.
President
Macky Sall of Senegal summed up interventions by African heads of state
on Thursday with the following seven-point action list:
- Accelerate agricultural production by taking technologies to scale.
- Increase investment in research and development.
- Optimize technology.
- Improve business language in agriculture to open up to the world.
- Support access to markets and the installation of basic infrastructure and equipment.
- Invest in new businesses to transform agricultural produce to support small producers.
- Create a facility for agricultural transformation.
The
forum communiqué reflected these action points, emphasizing the call
for a financing facility for food security in Africa. It was agreed that
this would be an appropriate channel for scaling up climate resilience
and successful agricultural technologies. It would include digital
innovations to farmers across Africa and would allow countries to better
address malnutrition and child stunting.
Sub-Saharan Africa has a
quarter of the world’s arable land but only produces 10 per cent of its
agricultural output. The low productivity of staple crops makes African
agriculture uncompetitive. As a result, the continent imports one-third
of the calories consumed. This makes food systems more vulnerable and
dependent on external food supply chains.
The outcomes from this
week’s Leaders’ Dialogue will be communicated to the UN Secretary
General as Africa’s commitments towards the UN Food Systems Summit in
September this year. They will lay the foundation for Africa to present a
unified voice to step up efforts and partnerships towards reaching the
Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.
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