Impact Stories
Marthe Montcho: Blogging for social change
Marthe Montcho started her blog, L’Agriculture au féminin or Women in Farming, in October 2013. Despite initially knowing very little about blogging, she quickly became a success as the blog grew in popularity. Montcho’s desire to fill what she saw as an information gap and empower female farmers, particularly in her home country of Benin, led to her winning the Youth in Agriculture Blog Competition (YoBloCo), organised by CTA in 2014.
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Agribusiness market information via mobile phone – one tool, many impacts
A market information service delivered by mobile phone is helping to promote transparency in Senegal, enabling farmers to obtain fairer prices for their products – including producers who have not signed up for the service.
Read MoreNew experience capitalisation publications: We’re half-way there
Three experience capitalisation booklets have just been launched and are now available – each one of them with 12 stories describing and analysing the work of different projects and organisations in East and West Africa.
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Training business savvy producers in Togo
Togolese farmers are being trained in how to make better use of their land and, by establishing detailed business plans, they have also improved their access to finance.
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Developing capacity for open data in agriculture and nutrition
During the 'Africa Open Data Conference' held in Accra - Ghana, CTA, as part of the GODAN Action project activities, conducted a one-day workshop on 'Open Data in Agriculture and Nutrition' on Tuesday, 19th of July 2017.
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Ghana hosts a week of Open Data for Africa
Chipo Msengezi of CTA is at the Africa Open Data Conference this week. She will be running a training session and chairing the Capacity development panel. The 2017 Africa Open Data Conference in Accra, Ghana, is set to attract over 800 delegates drawn from all over Africa. The aim is to push the leadership role of the private sector in supplying, using, and demanding open data.
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News
Of financiers, farm-ternships and a failed catfish farmer
After losing 700 of 1,000 catfish fingerlings in her debut fish farming enterprise, Divine-Love Akam switched to working in agriculture, a sector many investors and banks think twice about supporting.
Read MoreCTA at the 2018 AYA forum
Under the theme “Technologies and Innovations for Youth in Agribusiness”, the 2018 African Youth Agripreneur Forum (AYAF) and AgriPitch Competition will be held in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire, on 9–13 April 2018. The events, organised by the African Development (AfDB), the Government of Côte d’Ivoire and with CTA’s collaboration, are expected to attract over 400 participants from across the continent, including young agripreneurs, agribusiness leaders, investors and development partners.
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Bayseddo: a digital platform to boost agriculture in Senegal
In 2016, Mamadou Sall, working with Thierno Souleymane and other young Senegalese entrepreneurs, launched Bayseddo, a networking platform for farmers and investors in Senegal, aiming to optimise agriculture through digital technology. The start-up won the CTA’s Pitch Agrihack 2017 competition, and its first results are already beginning to show.
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Growing African agribusiness through peer learning
At the 2018 African Agribusiness Incubator Network (AAIN) Conference and Expo, held from 7–9 March in Dakar, Senegal, CTA held an interactive session on how the incubation of women and youth entrepreneurs in agribusiness could be supported through ICT knowledge sharing and peer learning. As one of the co-organisers, CTA also sponsored 30 participants, comprising women and youth agripreneurs, ICT entrepreneurs, and a knowledge management team.
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New opportunities for Pitch AgriHack 2017
Six youth start-ups, who were each awarded with investment, promotional support, capacity building and network opportunities after winning CTA's 2017 Pitch AgriHack! initiative are looking forward to the new opportunities that 2018, and continuing support from CTA and partners, will bring.
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Communiqués
New index to tackle food safety scourge and threat to African health and trade
Dakar, Senegal, October 2. The African Food Safety Index (AFSI) launched today will help to tackle the burden of foodborne diseases that a recent global assessment found to be comparable to that of malaria, HIV/AIDs or tuberculosis.
Read MoreInnovations in rice value chains offer increased job opportunities for rural youth
The Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Co-operation (CTA), together with the Africa Rice Center (AfricaRice) and the Syngenta Foundation for Sustainable Agriculture, has launched a new project that will foster youth entrepreneurship, strengthen market ties, and enhance livelihoods in the rice sectors of Mali and Senegal.
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CTA Releases a New Guide for Young Entrepreneurs Working to Modernise Agriculture Through ICTs
A guidebook designed for young people interested in developing e-agriculture businesses in African Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries is launched on 26 April 2017.
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Boosting West Africa's regional grain trade through stronger market institutions and enabling policies
The level of intra-regional trade of cereals such as maize, millet, sorghum and rice is lagging way below its potential in West Africa, despite opportunities from flourishing local production and strong demand from growing urban populations. A conference on How to structure the grain trade in West Africa: which market instruments and public policy measures? will examine some of the current constraints to increased intra-regional trade in the cereals sector.
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Opening Statement by Michael Hailu, Director of CTA
Opening statement delivered by Michael Hailu, Director of CTA, at the Blending4Ag conference, on Monday 7 November. The Blending4Ag conference is taking place in Brussels and is focusing on the strategic use of international and national development finance and philanthropic funds to mobilise private capital flows into agricultural value chains in developing countries.
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Opinion articles
Parminder Vir OBE: “Agriculture presents extraordinary opportunities for young African entrepreneurs”
After a distinguished 30-year career as an award winning film and television producer and private equity investor in the industry, Parminder Vir accepted Tony Elumelu’s invitation to join the Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF). As CEO, among other projects, she has worked to launch the Tony Elumelu Entrepreneurship Programme.
Read MoreWill young people be attracted to the agricultural sector if access to finance is made possible?
Will young people be attracted to the agricultural sector if access to finance is made possible? Will they be willing to involve themselves in agriculture? According to Mike Njau, the answer is yes.
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Improving access to finance by farmers: what can central banks do?
The common feature of African farmers is that most of them practise small-scale subsistence farming. In the last few years, however, various interest groups started focusing on agriculture as one of the key drivers of rural development and the number of commercial farmers increased. Yet, most of them are still smallholders.
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Interviews
Online platform improves the livelihood of small farmers in Ghana
Michael Ocansey, a computer science specialist, and Francis Obirikorang, a chemical engineer, developed the online platform, AgroCenta, won CTA’s 2017 Pitch AgriHack initiative, which gives youth entrepreneurs an opportunity to develop their business services and accelerate the adoption of their services. In an interview with CTA, Ocansey talks about AgroCenta – which links small-scale farmers and farmer organisations in Ghana with a big online market to improve the prices they receive for their commodities.
Read Moree-Agribusiness: A vital resource for Togo’s agriculture sector
Back in March 2015, Togolese entrepreneur Edeh Dona Etchri launched the e-Agribusiness platform to connect people and organisations across the country’s agriculture sector. It has proved a vital source of information for otherwise isolated farmers and is helping to grow the sector nationwide. The Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA) worked with the founder to help him expand and market his business. Today, there are around 6,000 farmers across Togo using the platform.
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Youth – the driving force for agriculture in Africa
Reeta Roy, President and CEO of The MasterCard Foundation, highlights the work of the organisation’s second Young Africa Works Summit.
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Agribusiness: An opportunity for Africa
Jean-Michel Severino, President of Investisseurs & Partenaires (I&P) impact fund, and former executive director of the French development agency, AFD, explains the emergence of a new category of agricultural players in Africa: agribusiness entrepreneurs, along with their successes and challenges.
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Gilbert F. Houngbo: An optimistic perspective on rural transformation
Gilbert F. Houngbo, former Prime Minister of Togo and the new President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), outlines how he intends to lead the organisation in tackling global issues such as youth migration and gender inequality in poor, rural areas.
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Reviews
New directions for targeted outcomes
While reflecting on its 30-year history during its anniversary year in 2014, CTA was also busy making plans for the future. CTA's goal is to contribute to enhanced agricultural and rural development policies and inclusive value chains that promote food and nutrition security, prosperity and sustainable management of natural resources across Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific (ACP).
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Making Agriculture Cool
At every conference she has attended on the youth, Nawsheen Hosenally has been frustrated to hear that agriculture is not ‘cool’. The 29-year-old graduate in agricultural extension and information systems knew she wanted to do something to redeem the image of agriculture among young people.
Read MoreInvestors in Agribusiness Exploring US$82 Million Worth of Business Opportunities in Africa
Leading business leaders, policy makers and prominent development campaigners joined over 200 delegates to launch the first ever Nutrition Africa Investor Forum in Nairobi, Kenya, today.
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Young entrepreneurs lend glamor to African agriculture
In a long-sleeved shirt and jeans, expertly navigating eastern Rwanda’s bumpy back roads in a white four-wheel drive, Dieudonne Twahirwa looks nothing like the stereotypical African farmer.
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Technical and scientific articles
Transforming satellite data for smallholders
ICT Update spoke to Remco Dost, senior project manager at eLEAF, about the company's work, what it does with the raw data it sources from satellites and what role it is playing in the Market-led, User-owned ICT4Ag-enabled Information Service (MUIIS).
Read MoreIs the Internet of Things the future of farming?
In ACP countries, the use of smart ‘connected’ devices in agriculture is still at an experimental stage. Yet new projects are emerging, and global trends show how this new technology offers vital development opportunities.
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Climate-proofing communities in Mozambique and Rwanda
In drought and flood-prone communities in Mozambique and Rwanda, low carbon initiatives are introducing renewable solar-powered irrigation systems to reduce the use of fossil fuels and increase climate resilience.
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Women entrepreneurs: key factors to success in agribusiness
Women around the world are overcoming barriers to establish profitable businesses in the agricultural sector. However, strong links to high-value markets, access to necessary finance and resources, and sufficient business training are essential requirements for women business leaders to break through the ‘glass ceiling’ and expand their agribusinesses to compete on an international scale.
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Halatou Dem: The promising business of processing
Thirty-two-year-old Halatou Dem has been managing the Bamako-based cereal processing company Danaya Céréales for 7 years. The Malian company – with a staff of 33 – exports its processed products to Europe, the US and throughout West Africa.
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Background articles
A promising new continent-wide trade agreement for Africa
The new African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) is expected to be a game changer, boosting inter-African trade, spurring manufacturing, and creating economic opportunities. But for its benefits to be realised, the details need to be negotiated; and Africa's leaders need to commit to AfCFTA for the long haul.
Read MoreLinking farmers to markets with just a click
A winner of CTA’s Pitch AgriHack competition, Farmart – an online farmers market – enables farmers to sell their produce for more money and reduce post-harvest losses.
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Aywajieune, developing online fish trading in Senegal
Aywajieune, winner of the Suguba Award for the best Senegalese start-up at Pitch AgriHack West Africa 2017, is the first platform in Senegal to connect fish sellers and buyers. Thanks to the CTA, the startup will receive support from Ernst & Young to help it develop plans for growth.
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Offering ICT solutions to meet the specific needs of Ivorian farmers
In Côte d’Ivoire, ICT4DEV, the best Ivorian start-up at Pitch AgriHack 2017, has developed mobile applications to meet the needs of local farmers.
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Boosting legume farming in Ghana
Despite increasing demand for soybean in Ghana, farmers are not able to make the most of increasing opportunities in the value chain as a result of poor yields. In northern Ghana, the N2Africa is helping smallholder farmers boost their yields by inoculating their seeds with rhizobium strains to increase biological nitrogen fixation. These inoculants have already boosted the yields of 1,500 farmers by 1.2 t/ha.
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