Browsing: Agriculture

Across the region, agriculture has been a crucial economic activity that has to levitate communities’ economies and promote some major changes, in farmer’s lives. 

Farming has changed significantly over the past decade. This change has not occurred or is being adopted evenly across the globe. Europe, North, South America, and Asia have been developing and utilizing agriculture mechanization quite fast. 

However, the latter has not been active in sub-Saharan Africa for a while. For the record, farming practices present during the 1960s when most of Africa, was liberating itself from colonial hands, are largely being divorced currently. …

A recent report by Save the children has revealed that Kenyan children born over the past year will on average face 4.6 times more drought during their lives than their grandparents.

According to the research, the risk is significantly higher in many low- and middle-income countries, particularly in Asia and Africa. Compared to 60-year-olds, newborns in Afghanistan will confront 5.3 times more drought in their lifetimes.

“In Tanzania and Kenya, children will face 2.8 and 4.6 times the exposure to drought, respectively,” it read in part.

The organisation also noted that the children will be the most affected because they are at a greater risk of battling waterborne diseases, hunger and death due to drought and floods.
“Some children might even be hit by several disasters simultaneously or in quick successions such as drought, floods and fires,” it added.

According to an analysis by the International Federation of Red Cross …

The memorandum of understanding on agriculture cooperation between Rwanda and the Central African Republic (CAR) which was signed last week on Friday, offers a world of opportunities for peoples of both countries, according to the Rwandan Minister of State at the Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Resources

In an interview with a local media outlet on Tuesday September 7 2021, Jean Chrysostome Ngabitsinze said their agreement of understanding with the Central Africa Republic that was signed in Bangui, covers many agriculture-related areas in a bid to utilize the available arable land in CAR.

Some of the areas that the Rwanda government is looking to explore in due agreement date are; research in agriculture, land use and management, soil and water sustainable management, seed development to produce quality and highly productive seeds the advancement of the sector, crop and environmental protection, climate change adaptation, aquaculture and fishing, as well as agribusiness …

“Before the Forest and Farm Facility Programme (FFF) reached out to us, I faced many challenges in marketing the avocado produce from my farm,” says Paul Mitei, a farmer from Kiptoben Village, Nakuru County, Kenya.

Paul says he wanted to know more about how the avocado and tomato value chains worked, and the proper inputs that are critical to avocado cultivation and meeting market demands.

Paul is married with 3 children and has a 5-acre farm where his family tends to avocado trees. He says he started to grow avocadoes because other farmers in his community were growing them, but at that time he had poor crop management skills which led to low fruit yields, no profit and a lot of frustration. .

To improve his knowledge and capacity on the avocado value chain, he joined the Nakuru Small Holder Fruit Producers Association (NASFPA) with the hopes of higher sales …

South Africa has a market-oriented agricultural economy that is highly diversified and includes the production of all the major grains (except rice), The agricultural sector contributed around 10 percent to South Africa’s total export earnings in FY 2019 at a value of $10.7 billion. The grain industry (barley, maize, oats, sorghum and wheat) is one of the largest agricultural industries in South Africa, contributing more than 30% to the total gross value of agricultural production. The industry is comprised of a number of key stakeholders including input suppliers, farmers, silo owners, traders, millers, bakers, research organizations, financiers, etc but with increasingly severe weather, growing political volatility, cyber concerns and other threats, farmers need to continue to invest in their risk preparedness.

As the farming industry is disrupted by digital, insurers and intermediaries must anticipate emerging risks to remain relevant and be the partner that farmers need. Now’s the time for …

Even though East Africa’s two economic giants Kenya and Tanzania are seen as business rivals, the two conduct enormous trade between each other and least of all not been the trade of the staple, corn.

According to the UN COMTRADE database on international trade, Kenya exports to Tanzania clocked USD 294.94 last year (2020). In fact, Tanzania has now bypassed Uganda to become Kenya’s largest export market in East Africa.

Reports show that the US imported goods from Kenya worth $41.8 million in June this year and guess which country comes next, Tanzania recording an amazing $31.6 million of Kenyan imports followed by Uganda at  US$28.3 million.

Reciprocating the deal, Kenya is now accepting Tanzania’s maize into the country after a long period standoff where Kenya had banned the import of Tanzanian corn. Kenya placed a ban on Tanzanian maize for alleged contamination of  Mycotoxins.

Mycotoxins are poisonous compounds produced …

Families across the globe are increasingly unable to access and afford a diet needed for a healthy life due to loss of income, price increases and disruption in food and health care systems.

This is according to new research that indicates that in many populous low- and middle-income countries, the COVID-19 pandemic and its socio-economic effects are projected to cause a devastating increase in child malnutrition, a difficult situation that is likely to get worse if no urgent action is taken.

The Standing Together for Nutrition consortium (ST4N) research suggests that without immediate action, an additional 283,000 malnutrition-related deaths in young children are estimated by 2022 – equivalent to an additional 258 children dying per day.

Food Insecurity in Zimbabwe: A Crisis in the Making?

For those who survive, an additional 3.6 million stunted children will be affected by life-long physical and cognitive impairments, and 13.6 million more will become …

Data by the bloc reveals that the sector provides livelihoods for about 80 per cent of the region’s workers, and accounts for about 65 per cent of foreign exchange earnings.

The continent, which COMESA Secretary General Chileshe Kapwepwe said last month has the potential to feed its self and export to the rest of the world, has remained a net food importer for the last 15 years.…

Kenya’s agriculture sector grew by 5.1 percent in 2020, thereby preventing a contraction of the economy, amid the coronavirus pandemic, which ravaged a majority of other sectors.

Data from Deloitte’s East Africa Economies Report 2021 indicates that the sector remains fundamentally important to the Kenyan economy, contributing about 33 percent of the GDP and 56 percent of the employment, both formally and informally.

The report paints mixed performance in the sector in 2020, for instance, as of May 2020, Kenya’s Agricultural sector’s outlook was grim due to the locust swarm infestation affecting domestic agricultural production.

However, as of Q4 2020, the sector reflected a revamped outlook owing to favourable rains and success in beating back a second wave of desert locusts.

“As such, the sector is estimated to have posted a 5.1 percent growth in 2020, emerging as the silver lining sector,” the report says.

Exports

The report also shows …

Stakeholders of agriculture on the continent have urged governments to work with the private sector to build resillient food systems to bridge the widening gap in production.

Speaking during the Alliance for a Green Revoluton in Africa (AGRA)  organized Africa Green Revolution Forum (AGRF) Summit last week, speakers reiterated that food security cannot be achieved without a gvernment facilitated enabling environemnt for agribusiness to thrive. 

The summit was held ahead AGRF ,  slated for September in Nairobi, where   leaders, while celebrating the milestones the agriculture sector has made over the years, called on enhanced collaboration in transforming the continent’s food systems  amid rising concerns over global food shortages owing to increasing population, shrinking land and climate change.

“As we look at innovative ways of producing food to feed our people, assist our farmers and bolsters agribusinesses, we must explore ways of working together to actualize this commitment. The partnership between …