Nutrition Security

A One Health approach to plant health 
A “One Health” approach – a collaborative and transdisciplinary perspective that recognizes the health of people, animals, plants and their environments as closely connected. In this approach, agricultural practices and plant health outcomes are both determined by, and contribute to, ecological, animal and human health.
(via CIP | cipotato.org)

Food Security

Driving Private Sector Investments to Enhance Food security in Priority Value Chains in Africa: Case Study of AGRA’s Investment Facilitation Platform
Concerning agriculture-related goals, the challenges already facing African farmers are compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic. The loss of income and jobs, stringent transport restrictions, increased economic uncertainty and supply chain disruptions has led to food security concerns. This has given even more urgency to the need for increasing and sustaining private investment in Africa’s agriculture.
(via AGRA | agra.org)

Sustainable agriculture

Report: Framework for Boosting Intra-African Trade (BIAT) in Agricultural Commodities and Services 
FAO and AUC have launched a blueprint for expanding agricultural trade between African countries and aims to unlock the potential of the agricultural sector to contribute to sustainable and inclusive growth for Africa. Increased trade represents a paradigm shift away from business as usual and is an important part of the collaborative work towards boosting food security and nutrition for all Africans.
(via PAEPARD | paepard.blogspot.com/)


Find out more on the Agora!

Source: LEAP4FNSSA Website

The FNSSA Partnership is an important collaborative effort between Africa and Europe to undertake joint action in food and nutrition security and sustainable agriculture.

A Roadmap sets out priority research and innovation areas for this cooperation, in which a number of actions have already taken place, resulting in a diverse set of achievements for the Partnership.

Check out this infographic showcasing the scope and success of the Partnership!
[.pdf | 181 KB]

Source: LEAP4FNSSA Website

The AU-EU Research and Innovation Partnership in FNSSA brings together African and European partners to investigate key questions of mutual interest around sustainable intensification, agricultural and food systems for nutrition, expansion and improvements of agricultural markets and trade, and cross-cutting issues that impact these.

To better understand the Partnership, two studies have been published.

The first showcases the ongoing research and innovation being undertaken as part of this Partnership. The second analyzes the implications of recent AU and EU studies on the FNSSA Roadmap.

Read/download:

- Study on the projects funded to support the FNSSA Partnership [.pdf | 2 MB]
A report submitted by Agricultural Research Council (ARC) of South Africa and Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU)

- Implications of the content of recent European Unionand African Union policy documents on the Food Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture (FNSSA) Roadmap [.pdf | 2,3 MB]
by the Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM) and Wageningen University and Research (WUR).

Author: Norhan El Dallal (MHESR)

In an attempt to raise awareness on topics and initiatives concerning the EU-AU Research & Innovation partnership on FNSSA and to announce the planned ‘Platform’ to relevant actors, the 1st Raising Awareness Event was organised by MHESR in close collaboration with CIHEAM-IAMB and CIRAD. The key outcomes of the event are:

Stakeholders Involvement

• Establish a network and a collaboration mechanism of ALL stakeholders
• Strengthening the participation of European and African youth in policy dialogue, and ensuring that vulnerable or minority sub-groups, such as younger youth and women, are not left out
• Reaching out to European and African entrepreneurs as they are the forefront of innovation.

Governance Framework for the FNSSA Partnership

• Declining importance of aid and donors vs growing importance of private sector investment & trade
• Apply a participatory approach and ensure that the mandate meets the needs of the expected partners, from both continents
• Co-create research agendas... Ownership, accountability and sustainability

Functional Contributions and communication

• Avoid duplication with existing initiatives and build on existing alliances instead of starting from scratch.
• Cluster regional needs and topics and support collaborative and timely data collection and analysis.
• Strengthening access to financial products and more funding for scaling innovation.
• Connect European and African Tech Ventures focusing on Agriculture

Author: Kwesi Atta-Krah (IITA)

The LEAP4FNSSA: Long-term EU-AU Partnership for Food and Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture held an Expert Workshop on Food Systems Resilience for Europe and Africa on Tuesday, April 20, 2021. The workshop, which had over 96 people (64% female 36% male) excluding the organizer in attendance was focused on reviewing the result of a study on Food Systems Resilience commissioned by the LEAP4FNSSA Working Group and conducted by the University of Hohenheim with the objective of making recommendations that could shape future policies in bi-regional (Africa-Europe) collaboration on research and innovation (R&I) in this domain.
 

The workshop received the presentation of the study report, done by a team of three, from the University of Hohenheim, Research Centre for Global Food Security and Ecosystems (Carolin Callenius, Tom Pircher, and Dr. Karen Tiede). The presentation covered aspects such as i) conceptual framework for food systems resilience, ii) balancing synergies and trade-offs, iii) resilience to shocks and stresses – e.g. COVID-19, iv) food system resilience in policies of EU and AU bi-continental cooperation, and ended by providing v) guiding principles for resilience building in food systems and sustainable agriculture. The study presentation was followed by a panel session of five invited experts:

• Prof. Julian D. May, Director, NRF-DST, Univ. of the Western Cape, South Africa.

• Dr. Bussie Maziya-Dixon, Food and Nutrition Systems Specialist, IITA.

• Dr. Victor Ajieroh, Senior Program Officer, BMGF

• Dr. Sandrine Dury, Agricultural Economist, CIRAD

• Dr. Bart de Steenhuijsen Piters, Snr Research Coordinator, Wageningen University.

The panel session, moderated by Dr. Kwesi Atta-Krah of IITA, member of LEAP4FNSSA Task 1.3, enabled the experts to share their thoughts and perspectives on the study report and deliberate on the key outcomes and recommendations. The workshop was inclusive and participatory, with active engagement of participants through the Chat box, Polling and Mentemeter contributions. Additionally, there was a Breakout session with four groups, each addressing the two points:

i) Do you think the subject of Food systems resilience is suitable to include in priority topics for the EU-AUR&I partnership on FNSSA? 

ii) How can Research and Innovation (R&I) contribute to identifying pathways to more resilient food systems? 

All the 4 groups unanimously agreed that the subject of Food systems resilience is a suitable area to include in priority topics for the EU-AU R&I partnership on FNSSA in the future and highlighted some research areas to be addressed in a Europe-Africa FNSSA platform.

The International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) was the lead convener of the workshop, supported by University of Copenhagen and Wageningen University, all within the LEAP4FNSSA Partnership.

Conclusion
The workshop ended with a closing Keynote presentation on “UN Food Systems Summit and implications for Africa”, given by Dr. Jemimah Njuki, Director for Africa, of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
The workshop made major contributions in the assessment of the Food Systems Resilience study, and will contribute to the AU-EU R&I Partnership on Food and Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture (FNSSA) and its Roadmap to Research and Innovation (R&I) programming, by African and European R&I funders and program owners. The workshop and study will also feed into international discussions, such as the UN Food Systems Summit Dialogues and its main events in July and September.

Why an Open Consultation
An open consultation is a participative instrument to open the decision-making process to all those willing to get involved. Its main objective is to listen to often unheard voices and make good use of them: it is the first step towards a participative democracy.
Concerning the African countries and the issue related to food, nutrition, and sustainable agriculture, launching an open consultation will gather points of view of different actors: funders, decision-makers, scientific community, farmers, entrepreneurs, consumers, and civil society at large.

The proposed open consultation is aimed to collect feedback on possible actions to build a brand-new Europe- Africa multi-stakeholder platform.

What is the Platform?
To improve the Food and Nutrition Security and the Sustainability of Agriculture (FNSSA) in Europe and in Africa, the European Union (EU) and the African Union (AU) have established a 10-years FNSSA Roadmap to strengthen their collaboration in Research & Innovation (R&I) in this domain. To this aim, and to catalyze progress along with this roadmap and boost the impact of these R&I collaborations, it is proposed to establish a Europe-Africa multi- stakeholder Platform which will bring together Research and Innovation efforts and investments in the field of Food, Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture (FNSSA) as described in the AU-EU High-Level policy Dialogue(HLPD) roadmap on FNSSA.
The objective of the proposed open consultation is to collect inputs on the Platform, including a) services to be offered, b) sustainability after the end of the project.

Why participate?
Starting from your needs, you can highlight specific services that the Platform might offer to your activity. Above all, you can contribute to a bottom-to-top process in building the Platform.
The outcomes of the open consultation will be discussed during the 2nd Dissemination event towards decision makers and research and innovation funders that will be held virtually, on June 22, 2021.

You will have the occasion to be directly engaged in this event: in fact, a group of selected panelists will analyze all your answers and they will downscale needs, services, and sustainability factors according to the situation in West Africa.

Have your say! Take part in the consultation!
Fill in the open consultation here! Also available in French.

2nd Raising Awareness Event | 19th May 2021
Ensuring an efficient intermediation between farmers, researchers and decision makers is a priority in Europe and in Africa. Establishing a network and a collaboration mechanism between diverse stakeholders (Institutions, Private Sector, and funders) from two continents demands tailoring the FNSSA platform to go beyond the particular strengths and needs of each group, in order to identify the intersections between all these needs, how the various strengths can be connected to create synergies, etc.

The 2nd Raising Awareness Event will tackle the following issues:

The added value of the proposed bi-continental IRC platform
This discussion will present examples from the current landscape of existing platforms and programs in an attempt to avoid duplication and build on existing initiatives.

The EU AU FNSSA R&I Partnership a “Game Changer”- Moving out from the usual “aid paradigm” to a real “partnership” between the two continents
The discussion in this session will be on how can the different European and African stakeholders contribute to shape the bi-continental partnership, see what lies ahead, and align the AU-EU priorities in the FNSSA field.

Register now!

FNSSA Stakeholder Engagement Week | 31 May - 4 June 2021
The LEAP4FNSSA Project will be hosting a Stakeholder Engagement Week in food, nutrition security and sustainable agriculture (FNSSA). The event is aimed at cross-sectoral participation from governments, universities, SMEs, development agencies, research institutes, agribusinesses and farmer organizations. The FNSSA Stakeholder Engagement Week will take place virtually from 31 May to 4 June 2021. The event aims to demonstrate the value of the FNSSA Partnership and to respond to the priorities identified in the FNSSA Research and Innovation Roadmap with emphasis on:

• fostering dynamic engagement of stakeholders such as funders, SMEs, farmers, researchers, government organizations, private sector organizations and strategic decision-makers;
• highlighting the results and outcomes of the investments made towards the FNSSA Partnership and encourage clustering around the FNSSA Roadmap;
• gathering information and ideas on the experiences, challenges, feedback and recommendations to further develop the R&I Partnership on FNSSA.

• Successes from the Partnership and their Impact;
• The experiences of using a multi-actor approach in projects for delivering the FNSSA Roadmap;
• Exchange on collaborative funding for the R&I Partnership; and
• Ways to future cooperation in R&I in the area of FNSSA.

2nd Dissemination Event | 22 June 2021

This event is part of the process building on the outcomes from previous LEAP4FNSSA events and on giving voice to a wider audience through an Open Consultation (OC). Particularly, the 2nd Dissemination Event toward African and European funders, policy makers and other actors in the field of food and nutrition security and sustainable agriculture (FNSSA)” is based on:

• Feedback from the West Africa Workshop 2020 (WAW2020, held in October 2020): the synthesis of contributions of both idea-carriers and experts, including the limiting factors, the actors to be involved and the actions to be implemented to revamp the farmers/research and innovation/market system in the sub-region.
• Outcomes from the 1st Raising Awareness Event (1st RAE) held in November 2020: "Towards an Inclusive FNSSA Partnership: Crises as opportunities to rethink an unsustainable model and empower engagement in R&I in Africa" organized by MHESR. This event developed an action plan and a set of recommendations for the implementation of the AU-EU platform.