The Africa development bank (AfDB) has announced its disbursement of $5.93 million grant to boost productivity in the agricultural sector in Africa.
Jonas Chianu, Coordinator, Agriculture fast track fund, AFDB speaking at the knowledge sharing network mission in Abuja said that there is an urgent need to close the yield gap and build the robust agriculture sector to sustainably feed the growing population in Africa.
“The African development bank regional member countries that are eligible for the AFT grant awards are Benin republic, Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Senegal and Tanzania”
Chianu stressed that he bank through its Agriculture fast track fund has supported 63 projects in 10 countries of Africa, adding that the fund seeks to support agriculture small and medium enterprise by off-setting the project cost preparation activities and advance pipeline of bankable projects. “Of the total $15.88 million approved for the projects $5.93 million has so far been disbursed”.
“Ending hunger and malnutrition is a moral imperative of our generation and the AFT is a critical component of the feed Africa strategy”, he said.
Ebrimal faal, Country director, AfDB in his remark said that the initiative which is being funded by the USAID , SIDA of the Sweden government and DANIDA of the Denmark government speaks to the commitment of the united nations to reduce poverty in the continent to below 3 percent by 2030 as the number of hungry people soars over 820 million people while over 200 Africans are malnourished.
He said “Over 60 percent of the world’s arable land is in Africa, over 60 percent of population is in agriculture but due to poor agricultural there has been a constant increase of import despite large resources”
Abdulahi Baba, representing the country director stressed that it is disheartening to know that projections have shown that the total value of food imports will rise to $110 billion by 2050 adding that it is of serious concern to the bank.
“AfDB in its effort to reduce this statistics, launched the feed Africa program among the high-fives of the bank which include light up and power Africa, feed Africa, integrate Africa, industrialize Africa and improve the quality of life of the Africa people”.
“Over 95 percent of the sustainable development goals would be achieved in Africa if these high-fives are achieved hence there is need to harness the full potential of the agriculture sector has become imperative”.
Nylander Fanny, Head of economic affairs and trade promotion, speaking on behalf of the Sweden government said that developing the agricultural sector is critical for economic development, job creation and food security.
She said “Funding and developing bankable projects is of great importance as access to finance and credit has remained a major challenge to agriculture in Africa”.
“We promote and facilitate connection between financiers and projects and we hope that the funds will be of value to the beneficiaries”.
Cynthia Egboboh, Abuja.
