gaps in the CAADP-based National Agricultural and Food Security Investment Plans (NAFSIPs) in Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, and Senegal: Assessment of investment programmes
A POLICY BRIEF
The Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Program (CAADP) is at the heart of efforts by African governments under the African Union ‘s New Partnership for Africa ‘ s Development (NEPAD) agenda to accelerate growth and eliminate poverty and hunger among African countries. The main goal of CAADP is to help African countries reach higher pathways to economic growth through the agricultural sector. CAADP provides a shared framework for strategic planning and partnership for the development of the agricultural sector. It also offers the prospect for political, technical and financial support for countries with plans and strategies, which are aligned with CAADP principles. Aligning with CAADP framework, therefore, requires countries to abide by two important objectives of the Maputo Declaration of: (i) achieving an annual growth rate of the agricultural sector of at least 6 percent; and (ii) allocating at least 10 percent of the national budget to agriculture.
In the West Africa region, Heads of States mandated the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) at their meeting in 2002 in Yamoussokro (Ivory Coast) to support and coordinate the implementation of the CAADP program. The ECOWAP/CAADP agenda is an integrated national and regional effort to support the implementation of national and regional investment programs, modernize the agricultural sector and improve livelihoods of the people. Following, the signature of the compacts, each country held a stakeholder meeting to review the draft NAIP and integrate comments and suggestions, which emerged during the compact to develop an investment plan, and operationalize it into an investment project to stimulate the growth of the agricultural sector. After four to five years of implementation, there is a need to assess the implementation of the NAIPs. This policy review focus on four countries: Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, and Senegal.
Study focus
Study focuses on reviewing national investment plans in the areas: land management, Land degradation/desertification and climate change. However, all these three themes are tightly related but they are quite different. The CAADP-Pillar 1’s main objective is to help countries extend their production areas under sustainable land and water. Here, we are mainly focusing on the land aspects.
Assessment of the investment programs
The regional investment program (RAIP) and the national agricultural investment programs (NAPs) are major instruments for operationalizing the strategies on how to ensure that interventions would promote growth quickly. Along the lines, ECOWAS and its’ member countries, have been working on six major themes of which three directly relates to this review: 1) water management 2) improvement of shared natural resources and 3) sustainable development of agricultural farms. Countries, therefore, have tried to identify activities that could be carried out under these three themes building on going processes.
1.The Burkinabe NAIP: National program of the Rural Sector (PNSR), 2011-2015
The program was declined into five main axes: 1) Improvement of food security and sovereignty; 2) Improvement of the income of rural people; 3) Sustainable development and natural resource management; 4) improvement of access to potable water; and 5)Development of the partnership between actors of the rural areas.
The growths of the various sectors of the agricultural economy were: food (1.5%), commercial (1.1%); livestock (2.7%); and forests and fisheries (1%). These results clearly show that the agricultural sector is not adequately playing its role of the Burkinabe economy and hence contributing to the impoverishment of rural communities.
In that respect, the successful of the NAIP in Burkina must focus on three main sub-axes: 1) focus on providing improved seeds and fertilizer to farming communities; 2) rehabilitating and extending irrigated areas, especially given that Burkina like the other three Sahelian countries face frequent droughts and food shortages.
2.The Malian NAIP: National Priority Investments in the Agricultural Sector (PNIP-SA), 2011-2015
The approach of the plan is quite innovative as it focuses on three main programs, which are all geared towards responding to market demands: 1) promotion of cereals (maize, millet/sorghum, and rice); 2) promotion of livestock products (meat and milk); 3) promotion of fisheries and aquaculture; and 4) crosscutting issues.
CAADP modeling results in Mali has shown that the food sector contributed only 1%, the commercial sector, 1.4% and livestock 1.9%. Mali has a large comparative advantage for both crop and livestock production. Better integrating these two sectors would reduce costs greatly and also achieve higher impacts. There is scope to better integrate crop production and livestock by developing a third program that would focus on food and feed value-addition, especially making high value feeds for livestock and poultry for the region.
3.The Nigerien NAIP: Plan d’Actions de l’Initiative 3N
The national Investment program for Niger was discussed, validated, and the pact signed on December 15, 2010. However, severe food crises retarded the implementation of the NAIP and a formulation of a new initiative that came with 11 priority actions: 1) increasing irrigated farming; 2) modernization of rainfed-cropping; 3) securing livestock production; 4) intensification of long-cycle production systems; 5) intensification of short-cycle production systems; 6) sustainable management of land and biodiversity; 7) valorization of forest products; 8) transformation and marketing of products; 9) prevention and management of food crises and catastrophes; nutrition improvement of the Nigerien; and 11) capacity strengthening for the implementation of the 3N initiative.
The modeling results have shown that the contribution of the various sectors to the agricultural economy has been variable: irrigated farming (4.2%); rainfed cropping (2.4%); livestock (2.5%) and forests (2%). Similarly to Burkina Faso, there would be need for a focus on three to four priority actions, especially PIP-1, PIP-2, PIP-4 and PIP-5.
4.The Senegalese NAIP: Implementing the ECOWAP/CAADP process in Senegal, Investment Plan, 2011-2015
Senegal, like the other three countries developed its program as a strategy and prioritization process. All the sectors were evaluated and their impacts on the performance of the agricultural and national economy were also evaluated. The program was developed along the 6 axes of the CAADP: 1) Promotion of water control; 2) preservation and sustainable management of other natural resources; 3) increasing production and improving productivity; 4) development of the transformation of agricultural products; 5) market access; 6) strengthening research for better generation and transfer of new technologies; 7) strengthening the capacity of the actors; 8) coordination and piloting of the sectors. Clearly, there are two programs that are worth focusing: program-1-reduction of climatic risks through water control and 2) program-3-increasing production and improving productivity. In addition, these activities were selected according to their stage of formulation. These activities must be inserted on a-five-year schedule to better see the implementation plan.
Conclusion
The reviews of the NAIPs in the four countries reveal that every country succeeded in domesticating the ECOWAP/CAADP process in their policies and strategies. These NAIPs outlined their long term strategy for the development of their rural sector. Though, Mali is the sole country whose NAIP has moved from strategy to priority by selecting as well as developing projects for the three priority areas 1)food crops: rice, maize and millet); 2) livestock (meat and milk) and 3) fisheries. The Malian NAIP also tried to identify leverages for achieving program objectives. The other plans are missing that intermediary step that makes any project appealing and therefore bankable for donors and private sector.
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