The return of Africa to the international scene, which is particularly due to the ongoing food crisis, is a historic opportunity that should be utilized to mobilize the continent to reduce poverty and achieve food security, a senior NEPAD official has said.
These remarks were made on Thursday in Dakar by Richard Mukandiwira, head of the agriculture component at the secretariat of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD), according to the African News Agency.
"We are delighted that the international community is beginning to listen to Africa. And this is, without a single doubt, a new development," said the NEPAD official, when opening a workshop on restitution of a framework document on the Development of Agriculture in Africa (CAADP).
The ultimate goal of the CAADP Pillar 2 framework document is to accelerate the growth in the agricultural sector across the African continent in order to meet the food needs of the people adequately, said the NEPAD head.
The document is aimed at reinforcing the capacity of private sector actors, both producer-marketers and "small-holder farmers so as to meet the complex requirements of local, regional and international markets in terms of quality and logistics increasingly," said Mukandiwira.
In his opening speech, Mukandiwira welcomed the progress that has been made in the preparation of the CAADP Pillar 2 document, which, according to him, "concerns the improvement of infrastructure and communications capabilities in order to facilitate access to markets."
"This is a very important development that has been undertaken with the involvement of the NEPAD," said Mukandiwira, adding that a window of opportunity through which Africa could tackle its problems had emerged.
"In the spirit of the NEPAD, Africa should develop its own agenda designed by African institutions," according to Mukandiwira, who called on the continent to join hands to tackle the many challenges that it was facing.
At the end of their summit held in 2003 in Maputo, Mozambique, African heads of states and governments had agreed on the allocation of 10 percent of their budgets for the agricultural sector.
During the same summit, the present leaders adopted a detailed program designed to promote the sustainable development of agriculture in Africa, as part of the important pillars of the implementation for NEPAD.
"This program is a logical step in the implementation of the vision of African heads of states and governments to work together to eradicate poverty, achieve food security and build the foundations for sustainable development in our continent on the basis of agriculture," said Senegalese Agriculture Minister Amath Sall, who also addressed the opening session of the two-day workshop.
"The joint actions of ECOWAS and the NEPAD secretariat have helped devise an action plan to equip the sub-region with a single unifying framework for designing and implementing development activities in the agricultural sector," said the minister.
The minister was referring to the common agricultural policy that is being crafted by the West African Economic Community (ECOWAS) in its attempt to deal with the biting food crisis.
Source:Xinhua
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