15th annual continental meeting of CAADP

11-14 June 2019. Nairobi, Kenya. The four-day CAADP partnership platform, “Enhancing Trade and Market Access for Accelerated Agriculture Transformation,” is an annual continental forum.

It brought together stakeholders in African agriculture and food security sectors with an aim “to address challenges in order to consolidate and accelerate progress towards agricultural transformation in Africa.

• The AU also urged African countries and pan African institutions operating in the agriculture sector “to create an enabling environment for agricultural trade through appropriate policies, governance and institutional arrangements.”
• The AU also stressed the need to enhance investments and market access in the agriculture sector in order to ensure agriculture commercialization and the participation of all players in the value chain, which include African smallholder farmers, the youth and women.

The AU, as part of the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) framework, aspires to transform the agriculture sector to realize the continent’s aspiration of ending hunger by 2025.

The AUDA-NEPAD as co-organiser of the Partnership Platform and implementor of CAADP projects at Regional and National level, was represented by a delegation led by Dr Hamady Diop, AUDA-NEPAD Head of Programme: Natural Resource Governance, Food Security and Nutrition , who spoke on behalf of the AUDA-NEPAD CEO, Dr Ibrahim Mayaki.

He spoke on the challenges in achieving enhanced intra-African trade, amongst these he highlighted the need for countries to showcase improved leadership when engaging in partnerships with development partners, silo mentality in the implementation of agriculture programmes at Regional and Country level and the continued lack of similar vision between state and private sector in the agricultural transformation agenda.

12 June 2019. CABI hosted a side meeting on operationalizing the Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA). The panel was composed of representatives from Economic Community of Central African states (ECCAS), Southern African Development Community (SADC), the Alliance for Commodity Trade in East and Southern Africa (ACTESA), German Society for International Corporation (GIZ) and the Kenya Agribusiness and Agroindustry Alliance (KAAA).

CABI’s brochure ‘Breaking Down Barriers –Support for supply chains: improving trade efficiency and profitability’, highlights initiatives and achievements made by the organization over the years working with key partners.