… The Malabo Declaration Review and Africa Agriculture Transformation…
Prime Minister Hailemariam Dessalegn, designated AU Champion for the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Program (CAADP), in collaboration with the African Union Commission, organized a Breakfast meeting on the Malabo Declaration Biennial Review and Africa Agriculture Transformation Scorecard on Monday (January 29).
The AU adopted the Malabo Declaration on Accelerated Agricultural Growth and Transformation for Shared Prosperity and Improved Livelihoods in June 2014, with the Assembly committing to mutual accountability for results and actions by conducting a biennial review that involved tracking, monitoring and reporting on the implementation progress. This year was the inaugural report and the Africa Agriculture Transformation Scorecard, tracking progress of the implementation of the Malabo Declaration, was presented to the Assembly. These comprised individual country performance scores on progress made for implementing the goals set out in the Malabo commitments. The aims are to create increased awareness at the highest level, to discuss the best ways of positioning agriculture to secure the required investments to move the agenda forward; and the most effective way of sustaining high level engagement with Heads of State and Government on the status of agriculture, using the scorecard for action and impact.
The Malabo Declaration has seven commitments: Recommitment to the Principles and Values of the CAADP Process; Commitment to Enhancing Investment Finance in Agriculture to 10% of annual budgetary allocation to agriculture; Commitment to Ending Hunger in Africa by 2025; Commitment to Halving Poverty, by the year 2025, through Inclusive Agricultural Growth and Transformation; Commitment to Boosting Intra-African Trade in Agricultural commodities and services; Commitment to Enhancing Resilience of Livelihoods and Production Systems to Climate Variability and other related risks; and Commitment to Mutual Accountability to Actions and Results.
The AATS captures 23 performance categories and 43 indicators for each Member State. The Inaugural Biennial Report was endorsed by the Ministers of Agriculture at the 2nd Specialized Technical Committee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Water and Environment held in October 2017, in Addis Ababa. The aim is that the AATS will encourage performance across AU Member States and provide a tool that can be used by every actor engaged in agriculture, across governments, the private sector, and non-state actors.
Prime Minister Hailemariam urging Member States to implement the Malabo Declaration said Ethiopia was currently providing 10% of its annual budget to the agriculture sector. As a result, he noted, “We are registering 10% growth in agricultural gross domestic product annually”. Earlier, sharing Ethiopia’s experience on CAADP implementation and efforts on ending hunger the Prime Minister stressed: “Here in Ethiopia, we recognize poverty and hunger to be our arch enemies”. He noted in recognition of this fact and the launch of CAADP, the government had been implementing an indigenous policy for agricultural development and other sectors. “Thanks to the tireless efforts of our agricultural extension workers and hardworking Ethiopian farmers, Ethiopia`s agriculture has continuously registered high growth rate even during unfavorable conditions,” he said. Despite natural disasters such as the 2015 El Nino-induced drought, agriculture and similar sectors had grown at annual rate of 10 percent for the last 15 years in average.
The Prime Minister said key elements in this were the introduction of effective policy and strategy framework, institutional arrangements and the political commitment in allocating resources. He said: “Our commitments in research, development and extension as well as improving institutional capacities remained instrumental in meeting the goals of poverty reduction and hunger elimination.” He mentioned mobile services to provide farmers with information regarding agricultural extension services contributed for improved productivity. Farmers had become beneficiaries of ICT services to access information on improved agricultural extension services from production to marketing and trade points. This, he said, had helped to increase production and productivity significantly. Since the launch of the CAADP, Ethiopia had managed to increase the productivity of cereal crops from 15.7 quintals per hectare to 23 quintals. In the same period, main season crop production by smallholder farmers had increased from 160 million quintals to 219 million. The Prime Minister, underlining that tackling poverty and hunger through rain fed agriculture was insufficient, emphasized the need to expand irrigation schemes and encourage irrigation development. He said that Ethiopia, since the launch of CAADP, had managed to increase irrigation coverage from half a million to 4.8 million hectares”.
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…Leaders urged to renew commitment to a malaria-free Africa…
At a high-level briefing on Friday (January 26), leaders stressed that African nations must renew their commitment and strengthen instruments to attain a malaria-free Africa by 2030. Senior health, finance and foreign affairs officials from across the continent were briefed on the latest findings from the World Health Organization’s World Malaria Report 2017, signaling that, for the first time in more than a decade, progress against malaria on the African continent, which accounts for almost 90% of the global malaria burden, had stalled.
Moussa Faki Mahamat, Chairperson of the African Union Commission, underlined the dangers. “Malaria alone is estimated to rob the continent of US$12 billion per year in lost productivity, investment and associated health care costs.” African leaders have committed to eliminating malaria by 2030. The AU Commission Chairperson said it was critical that the political commitment was sustained, “as articulated in the continental Agenda 2063, to eliminate malaria in Africa by 2030 through increased domestic financing, increased access to life-saving malaria interventions, as well as more robust health systems.”
While some African countries have seen a greater than 20% increase in malaria cases and deaths since 2016, others are showing that beating malaria is possible, according to the report from WHO. Dr. Pedro Alonso, Director of the WHO Global Malaria Program, said “In 2016, just 15 countries carried most of the global malaria burden, together accounting for 80% of all malaria cases and deaths. All but one of these countries are in Africa.” He said, “The report sends a clear warning that we have stopped making progress and that, without urgent action, we risk going backwards.” WHO used the occasion to launch a World Malaria Report 2017 mobile app that provides, at the pressure of a finger, the latest information on malaria policies, financing, interventions and burden in 91 endemic countries.
Dr Kesete Admasu, CEO of the Partnership to End Malaria, said, “African countries are at greatest risk of losing the significant gains made over a decade and must renew efforts to make fighting malaria a priority. Domestic funding needs to be urgently stepped up. These investments, only a fraction of what African nations will save if we succeed in eliminating malaria, will pay off, in millions more lives saved, health systems strengthened, economies grown and the world back on track to end this disease.”
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… OAFLA launches its “Free to Shine” campaign…
The Organization of African First Ladies Against HIV/AIDS (OAFLA) and the African Union on Monday (January 29) launched “Free To Shine”, a new campaign aiming to help end childhood AIDS in Africa by 2030 and keep mothers healthy. The campaign, initiated during the OAFLA General Assembly, will unite people and organizations from local and global levels to advance healthcare delivery to contribute to ending childhood AIDS and support personal and collective understanding of the actions that can be taken to end childhood AIDS. It will work to drive the effective delivery and use of healthcare services to keep mothers healthy, prevent mother to child transmission and ensure fast and effective identification and treatment of children infected by HIV.
Mrs. Roman Tesfaye, Ethiopia’s First Lady and President of OAFLA noted, “While Africa has made unprecedented progress in responding to the AIDS epidemic, the response to childhood AIDS is lagging behind. To end the AIDS epidemic in Africa, we must act now to prioritize the use of knowledge and the implementation of tools that exist, to keep children AIDS-free and their mothers healthy. Preventing new HIV infections will transform Africa’s broader health and development agenda and provide our children with a healthy and hopeful future.” There are up to 1.4 million children living with HIV in Africa, South of the Sahara, over half of all children living with HIV globally.
Dr. Marie-Goretti Harakeye, the Head of Division for AIDS, TB, Malaria and Other Infectious Diseases at the African Union Commission, told the Assembly, “We cannot end AIDS by 2030 if we do not focus on women and children. The Free to Shine campaign will drive for increased investments to strengthen health systems and achieve maximum impact where the burden is highest. She said: “The African Union is committed to ending AIDS as a public health threat by 2030, which will lay a strong foundation for Africa’s Agenda 2063 for socio-economic development and structural transformation.”
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…Equal Access of African Women to High Level Positions…
A High-level meeting on “Equal Access of African Women to High Level Positions at the African Union and in the United Nations Systems” was held on Sunday (January 28). Among those attending were Moussa Faki Mahamat, Chairperson of the African Union Commission; Professor Alpha Condé, outgoing Chairperson of the African Union; Mr. Nana Akufo Addo, President of the Republic of Ghana; Heads of State and Government of Member States of the African Union; UN Secretary General Guterres, and Ministers, Commissioners and other officials, highlighting the importance of addressing gender-specific challenges, encouraging gender equality and women’s participation, the placement of women in leadership positions at all levels. Participants recognized and applauded the considerable progress made in this regard at the highest level.
Mr. Moussa Faki Mahamat, AU Commission Chairperson firmly stated that the African Union was the first inter-governmental organization that had made parity at higher decision-making levels a reality. Applauding the placement of women in management positions in the Commission, he said that between 2013 and 2017 the gender gap had been reduced in strategic positions and the number of women in Director’s posts had increased from 29% to 45%. He said he was cognizant of the fact that yet more needed to be done, adding, “This is the time to renew my commitment to the Network of African Women Leaders and the initiative to launch a Fund to give African women the resources they need to make a real contribution to the economic development and transformation of the continent.” This initiative launched by the African Union Commission in partnership with the United Nations would also, he said, serve as a platform “to enhance the partnership of our two organizations in political matters and gender related programs.”
Professor Alpha Condé, outgoing AU Chairperson and President of the Republic of Guinea, noted he had appointed Nana Akufo Addo, President of the Republic of Ghana, as Champion on Gender and Development in Africa during his chairmanship. He also pointed out that the Republic of Guinea now had the largest ever number women in high office, including the Ministry of Economy and Finance and several National Directorates or Autonomous Services.
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