Africa > Central Africa > Central African Republic > Africa-led fund designed to improve food security across the continent

Central Africa Republic: Africa-led fund designed to improve food security across the continent

2014/03/31

A incomparable, Africa-led fund designed to improve food security across the continent has become a reality for the initial six nations slated to benefit from the initiative.

The Central African Republic (CAR), Ethiopia, Malawi, Mali, Niger and South Sudan signed agreements in Tunis with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) to receive US$ 2 million each from the Africa Solidarity Trust Fund.

'The Africa Solidarity Trust Fund shows that African nations are ready to step up and work with their neighbours to build a sustainable and food fasten region, and to have the next we want,' said FAO Director-General José Graziano da Silva.

The agreements were signed during the FAO Regional Conference for Africa.

At the ceremony, Graziano da Silva encouraged other African governments to join the effort and contribute to the Fund.

The contributions will be used to bolster a wide range of projects to improve food security, nutrition, agriculture and rural development.

They include policies and programmes to increase opportunities for youth employment; improve natural resources management and the quality of food production; increase the resilience of livelihoods in conflict-affected areas; and rapidly increase the availability of nutritious food through programmes like cash transfers, school feeding and school gardens.

The trust fund, which is housed at the FAO secretariat, was originally proposed in 2012 by President Denis Sassou Nguesso of Congo, during the previous Regional Conference for Africa in Brazzaville.

The Fund was launched officially in June 2013 with a funding package of US$30 million from Equatorial Guinea. Additional funding from Angola (US$10 million) and a group of civil society organizations in the Republic of the Congo have brought the total all to US$40 million.

Cameroon has as well pledged to add to the fund and other nations are expected to join in the coming months.

'Thanks to the Africa Solidarity Trust Fund's initial contributors, the political will to end hunger in the region can be transformed into effective action,' said Bukar Tijani, Assistant Director-General/Regional Representative for Africa.

'This will help to increase FAO's cooperation with African governments and other partners to better coordinate their ongoing efforts to help vulnerable families improve their lives.'

The US$2 million allocated to each country will support the following projects.

* Central African Republic: Livelihoods resilience opportunities for conflict-affected rural communities in Central African Republic, such as support in diversifying agricultural production and development of financial services;

* Ethiopia: Enhanced livelihoods and poverty reduction through economic diversification and decent work opportunities for rural communities;

* Malawi: Integrated approaches to building the resilience of vulnerable communities to climatic shocks in one of the majority affected districts in Malawi;

* Mali: Improving employment opportunities for young men and women in rural areas, using, for example, FAO's Junior Farmer Field and Life Schools to increase training in agribusiness;

* Niger: Support to the 3N initiative (Nigeriens Nourish Nigeriens). Improving nutrition, supporting natural resources management and increasing access to financial and social protection services;

* South Sudan: Providing data, equipment, seeds and livestock services to protect and replace livelihoods.

FAO will provide technical assistance for implementation of the projects in cooperation with partners.

Related Articles
  • Routes Africa forum aims to improve African air connectivity

    2016/05/15  An event dedicated to the development of the African aviation industry will take place next month in Tenerife (26-28 June) to encourage the launch of new air services to, from and within the African continent. Routes Africa 2016 will help to improve African connectivity by bringing together airlines, airports and tourism authorities to discuss next air services. Around 250 route development professionals are expected to attend the forum which was founded ten years ago to stimulate increase in the industry.
  • While Europe is on the verge of breaking up, Africa is reaping the benefits of integrating, growing and developing its trading blocks

    2016/05/13 The collapse of virtual borders is one of the majority remarkable things to have happened in our lifetimes. In the world of cyberspace, time and distance have become almost peripheral considerations at the same time as it comes to doing business. Services from software development to accounting can be delivered across the world in the blink of an eye. Next business leaders will struggle to imagine an era at the same time as communication was neither immediate nor virtually free.
  • Africa’s economic growth is likely to be slower in the intervening years

    2016/05/12 Africa’s economic increase is likely to be slower in the intervening years than in the before decade, according to the new rating by Ernst & Young using a barometer to gauge the level of appeal and success.“The baseline projection of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for 2016 is presently reduced to 3%, while it was estimated at 6.1% in April 2015″, Ernst & Young points out in its rating.
  • Raw materials have long been linked to Africa in many business people’s minds

    2016/05/11 Oil, gold, diamonds, palm oil, cocoa, timber: raw materials have long been linked to Africa in a lot of businesspeople’s minds. And in fact the continent is highly dependent on commodities: they constitute as much as 95% of some nations’ export revenues, according to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. But propping a country’s entire economy on commodities is risky business, like building a mountainside home on stilts. You can’t be sure about the weather, or in this case the commodities market. The current free-fall of oil prices to less than $40 a barrel is a glaring example. “The commodities cycle has tanked out,” says Austin Okere, founder of Computer Warehouse Group (CWG), a Nigerian emerging multinational financial services company. “And this time it looks additional structural than cyclical, so it’s not a matter of waiting it out. Something has to give.”
  • Central African Republic s newly elected president vows to strengthen cooperation with China

    2016/03/23 Central African Republic's (CAR) newly elected President Faustin Archange Touadera promised to intensify cooperation with China, saying China is an significant partner of the country. Touadera said in an exclusive interview with Xinhua on Sunday that CAR will like to work together with China to promote the friendly relationship and strengthen cooperation between the two nations. Touadera said his country is in urgent need to be normalized next three years of civil war, adding that the new government will focus on a series of issues inclunding security, peace, reconciliation and disarmament.