Photo by: Duane Daws
The adoption of the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) by the African agricultural sector ten years ago has enabled the repositioning of the continent’s agriculture industry as an engine for transformation in Africa, New Partnership for Africa’s Development (Nepad) CEO Dr Ibrahim Mayaki has asserted.
Speaking at the CAADP’s yearly continental forum, the Partnership Platform (PP), this week, in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, Mayaki said CAADP had enabled policymakers to engage with an array of stakeholders, such as farmers and producers, to optimise socioeconomic growth and ensure enhanced food security.
Further expounding on the initiative, Nepad programmes director Estherine Fotabong said that the CAADP had allowed a more structured way of thinking and planning in the agricultural sector through the introduction of a robust planning mechanism and platform for inclusive planning.
“Africa is not yet where it is supposed to be in terms of output, so the focus of [the] CAADP in the new decade will be on results and impact. [This] new strategy will enable the measurement of results on the ground, especially with regard to smallholder farmers’ lives,” she commented.
The PP brought together stakeholders in African agriculture, ranging from government, the private sector, international development agencies, the African Union, civil society and regional economic communities.
Through their engagements, delegates had been taking stock of the impact of the CAADP over the last ten years to determine the direction the programme would take in the coming decade.