july 2018 - african, caribbean and pacific group of states...help smallholders to use recommended...
TRANSCRIPT
Newsletter N° 4 July 2018
A major objective of the “New Approach
to ACP Group Support to Agricultural Value
Chains” is to transform and modernize ACP ag-
riculture. ACP youth has a major role to play in
this regard. And agriculture in ACP countries
provides fertile ground, despite weighty con-
straints, for youth employment and empower-
ment. Thus, it is estimated that 47% of African
rural youth works in agriculture (Gallup, 2010).
In the Caribbean and the Pacific, with the me-
dian age of the farmer population well above
55, young hands and brains are clearly needed.
To attract and anchor ACP youth in agricultural
producing areas, the constraints that they face
must be addressed, and the jobs on offer
should be remunerative and attractive.
Provision of technical and business ser-
vices by young professionals to small family
farms illustrates opportunities for youth in agri-
culture. The article describing this aspect of
GIZ’s contribution to implementation of the
ACP-EU Commodities Programme (CP) also ex-
plains how young service providers in West Af-
rica are earning a decent living while assisting
cocoa farmers in getting higher yields and in-
comes. Being more receptive to new tech-
niques and technologies, the young technical
business service providers transfer these to
their clients.
Alongside limited access to knowledge,
information, and to land, or poor linkages with
markets, access to finance has been identified
as one of the main obstacles to youth partici-
Technical Business Services
for Cocoa Farmers Generate
Jobs for Youth (GIZ)
Technical business services can
generate youth employment and make
farming more competitive and attractive.
Young professional service providers can
help smallholders to use recommended
production techniques and inputs for more
income.
This type of service provision to cocoa
farmers, and in agriculture in general, is a
very recent development in West Africa.
Most young rural professionals still lack the
expertise, skills and financial resources to
develop targeted and economically viable
business services required by cocoa
smallholders and which earn providers
sufficient income throughout the year too.
For some technical services, lack of
appropriate technology is also an issue.
As part of its activities in implementing
the Cocoa Food Link Programme (CFLP), GIZ
has partnered with private partners to bring
technical business services to cocoa small
holders.
175 young service providers have been
qualified.
As at mid-2018, they have served over
31,000 cocoa smallholders in Côte
d’Ivoire, Ghana and Togo.
E D I T O R I A L
(To be continued on page 2)
ACP-EU COMMODITIES
PROGRAMME
2
A C P - E U C O M M O D I T I E S P R O G R A M M E
The Cocoa-Food Link Programme (CFLP) is
co-funded by the EU as part of the ACP-EU
Commodities Programme since end 2014. CFLP
is implemented through the Sustainable
Smallholder Agri-Business Programme (SSAB)
commissioned by the German Federal Ministry
for Economic Cooperation and Development
(BMZ).
In the case of cocoa production, examples
of technical business services comprise GPS
measurement of plots, motorized pruning,
spraying of insecticides or fungicides, cleaning
of farms, cocoa harvesting and pod breaking.
These activities generate employment and
income for the youth who act as providers.
Attractiveness of these employments rise where
motorized equipment is used. On top of this, the
farmer clients receive services and quality
inputs geared towards higher yields and higher
incomes on existing farms. The intensification
strategy building on technical services avoids
deforestation by land expansion at low
productivity levels. Embedded in businesses of
agro-dealers, producer organizations and/or off-
takers, technical business services constitute a
significant opportunity for youth employment in
rural areas.
pation in agriculture (IFAD and FAO, 2011).
Due to their lack of collateral and financial lit-
eracy, among other reasons, rural youth does
not represent an attractive customer group
for financial service providers.
The article on “inclusive financial instru-
ments” outline how different approaches are
being harnessed by FAO under the ACP-EU CP
to go over such obstacles. The approaches
range from technical assistance to financial
institutions, to financial literacy activities,
training in agricultural finance and risks, or
development of tailored financial products.
While not restricted to youth, the Pacific
case study implemented by the SPC shows
the importance of linkages to markets for suc-
cessful development of small producers, even
when remotely located. Sales agreements
with bigger players and emphasis on quality
have facilitated such success where other
small producers failed.
Intra-value chain linkages is also the
essence of the article outlining CARDI and ITC
support to Caribbean coconut actors. Linking
producers and processors to regional and in-
ternational experts contribute to the updating
of planting and production techniques, disease
diagnosis and farm/firm management.
But do not take my word for it! Please
read the enclosed articles and discover for
yourself how our stakeholders and partners
are collaborating and innovating to transform
ACP agriculture!
Viwanou GNASSOUNOU
Assistant Secretary General
Sustainable Economic Development
and Trade
(From page 1)
(To be continued on page 3)
Pruning of cocoa trees
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A C P - E U C O M M O D I T I E S P R O G R A M M E
The modes of delivery are customized
to the specific needs, opportunities and
capacities of partners. The following service
delivery models have been put into practice:
Independent service providers or
employees of Business Service
Centres (BSC) in Côte d’Ivoire
Farmer-based organisations in Togo
Rural Service Centres (RSC) providers
of BSC in Ghana
In addition to the lessons specific to
each country, the following more general
lessons can be drawn from the CFLP
experience with technical business services:
The services offered need to part of a
service package developed on the
basis of sound economic analysis, and
need to provide sufficient and stable
living income along the year for the
service provider and family.
Technical services do not necessarily
create net profits for the involved
smallholders; increased production
costs may outweigh the additional
profits from additional yields. Prices
can drop as a consequence of
increased productivity.
Introducing technical service at large
scale allows purchase of equipment
and inputs in bulk, thus reducing the
costs for these items.
Strong business linkages between
hosts of technical business services,
input suppliers as well as equipment
dealers are essential to ensure timely
availability of inputs and equipment.
Technical business services have an
impact on employment in rural areas
(positive or negative) and by
influencing the yields also on prices.
Solid contracting modalities with
service providers are essential,
including reporting obligations; totally
independent providers are difficult to
manage.
Thorough monitoring and support of
providers by marketing/branding them
in the take-off stage is useful to trigger
market demand by the customers.
The services impact the entire
production model of the cocoa
smallholder. Side effects could for
example include resorting to children
for breaking of cocoa pods if the yields
increase significantly, or rendering
spraying service providers jobless if
proper pruning of trees reduces the
infestation with black pod disease.
RSC service providers during technical training session
(From page 2)
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A C P - E U C O M M O D I T I E S P R O G R A M M E
(To be continued on page 5)
Strengthening access to
inclusive financial
instruments for small
farmers engaged in the roots
and tubers sectors (FAO)
The provision of and access to
investment and working capital are major
issues for small farmers and processors of
the Roots & Tubers (R&T) industry in Sub-
Saharan Africa. Since 2014, with support
from the ACP-EU Commodities Programme,
the FAO African Roots and Tubers Project
(ART) is adopting a value chain finance
approach to increase access to finance and
investment opportunities for actors operating
in the roots and tubers value chains.
To properly tackle the issue of access
to finance in Benin, Cameroon, Ghana, Côte
d'Ivoire, Malawi, Uganda and Rwanda, the
ART project identified relevant gaps,
constraints and opportunities by carrying out
a series of analyses of the demand and
supply of financial services within specific
R&T value chains for each country. The
results of these assessments helped to put in
place tailored activities related to provision
and access to financial services.
Targeting Financial Provision
As at mid-2018, the ART project
provided technical assistance to over 60
financial institutions on risk assessments,
design investment strategies and partners’
identification to provide customized financial
services to farmers, cooperative, processors
and Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs).
National events on Agricultural Value Chain
Finance took place in all the 7 countries
covered by the project, and a regional lesson
-sharing workshop was organized during
the African Microfinance Week, held in
Addis Ababa on October 2017. In addition,
the rising need for small actors to access
risk financing services, such as crop
insurances, resulted in some 65
stakeholders trained in the area of
Agricultural and Climate Risk Financing.
Targeting Financial Access
In parallel, financial literacy and
awareness- raising activities on financial
products have been organized for small
value chain actors along with capacity
building of farmers and processors in
business and financial management through
Farmer Field Schools (FFS), digital
information, and platforms at community
level. These initiatives increase producers’
and processors’ capacity to mobilize
financial resources by reducing the existing
information gaps to increase access to such
services.
Members of a potato cooperative enabled to access loans as result of the project activities in Rwanda ©FAO/Margherita Bavagnoli
5
A C P - E U C O M M O D I T I E S P R O G R A M M E
Results
The project reached over 70 MFIs
and FIs, while 175 stakeholders have also
been linked to be able to provide/access
tailored agricultural insurance products.
The support of FAO activities by the ACP-
EU funding further resulted in 375 small
loans collectively secured by farmers,
cooperatives and traders from
microfinance providers and the
commercial banks. In addition, in Rwanda
alone, 18,000 USD have been saved by
small actors under FFS schemes. In
Uganda, fast-track access to small loans
to cover short-term capital flows on
farms, or for farmers with no land or
asset collateral, is now possible due to
the establishment of 60 savings and
credit schemes that have amassed equity
of 20,790 USD. Furthermore, 2 new
tailored financial products for cassava
and potatoes were developed with the
project’s support. A unique insurance
product for potato farmers is also being
developed with the Uganda Agribusiness
Alliance and the Insurance Consortium.
The findings of the country
analyses, the recommendations made at
the regional lesson-sharing workshop
during the African Microfinance Week in
2017, as well as the success stories
collected from the countries, have been
synthesized in a broader study on
“Potential solutions for unlocking
investments in small agribusinesses with
growth potential.” The promotion of
success cases in other countries
stimulated cross-countries knowledge
sharing visits. Lastly, a series of
partnerships have been established with
P l at form for Agr i cu l tu ra l R i sk
Management (PARM) - IFAD, World Food
Programme (WFP), PULA and Acre Africa
as well as with other divisions and
projects in FAO, to improve the quantity
and quality of the services available
while enriching the project’s visibility at
global level.
(From page 4)
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A C P - E U C O M M O D I T I E S P R O G R A M M E
“One of the great things about partici-
pating in the study of our value chain is that
we’ve been able to show our farmers that if
they sell their husked coconuts to us, they
are actually getting paid a lot more than if
they extract the copra and sell that” Teri-
kano explained.
The study helped to develop new in-
sights and new connections. An example of
linkages is that BVCO has obtained agree-
ment for on-going sales of oil to Essence of
Fiji, contributing to increase sales by 30 per-
cent. It is also expected that the study will
help BVCO to source new markets and pri-
vate investment as well as industry develop-
ment support by documenting the current
business case.
Other barriers to expansion are also
being addressed. The road to the factory on
the island has been recently improved by
the Rabi Council. The Fijian Ministry of
With ACP and EU Sup-
port, CIDP helps remote pro-
ducers achieve market share
against all odds (SPC)
In the Pacific, many small virgin
coconut oil enterprises have been promoted
as viable village-scale enterprises. However,
several have failed by not having adequate
connections to end-markets; not being of
sufficient scale to achieve the throughput of
product required for adequate returns on in-
vestment; and struggling to achieve low final
moisture contents in their oils (<1 per cent).
Launched in 2014 by Terikano Takesau
to improve opportunities for her Banaba peo-
ple living on Fiji’s Rabi Island, Banaban Vir-
gin Coconut Oil (BVCO) has managed to stay
in business through a combination of hard
work, community cohesion and support from
partners.
In the early days, Terikano toured the
island and spoke to the different village as-
sociations. She explained how they could
harvest and sell coconuts to BVCO, use the
by-products to make handicrafts, weave and
sell baskets to assist in transporting coco-
nuts by boat around the island to the fac-
tory.
Another key contributor to the success,
were the results of a market analysis and
value chain study of the BVCO value chain
commissioned by the Coconut Industry De-
velopment for the Pacific (CIDP) programme.
This programme is managed by the Pacific
Community (SPC) as part of the EU-funded
ACP-EU Commodities Programme. The study
is being used as a model for the many small
virgin coconut oil businesses in operation
across the Pacific.
Terikano Takesau, founder - Banaban
Virgin Coconut Oil
Photo credit - D. Dore
(To be continued on page 7)
7
A C P - E U C O M M O D I T I E S P R O G R A M M E
Sharing best practices to
sharpen competitiveness of Car-
ibbean Coconut Industry (ITC/
CARDI)
On the 20th of June 2018, the International
Trade Centre (ITC) and the Caribbean Agricultural
Research & Development Institute (CARDI) held an
“International Coconuts Conference” in Santo Do-
mingo, in the Dominican Republic, under the aegis
of the EU funded ACP-EU Commodities Programme.
The said programme aims to strengthen the com-
petitiveness of the coconut sector in the Caribbean
and increase economic opportunities for small-
holder farmers and SMEs in the region.
Hosted by the Junta Agroempresarial Domini-
cana (JAD), with the support of partners such as
the Ministry of Agriculture, Lead Firms - Grupo
Rica, Goya and Tropijugos - and the Delegation of
the European Union to the Dominican Republic, the
conference gathered stakeholders from the region’s
coconut sector, as well as international experts
from CIRAD, Tetra Pak, the Scientific Research
Centre in Yucatan, Mexico, Jamaica’s Coconut In-
dustry Board, and from Farmers Community Devel-
opment Foundation International (Philippines).
(To be continued on page 8)
Quality is Key
The sun-drying process used by
Banaban Virgin Coconut Oil VCO makes
the difference in their oils. Oil is dried
for a period of up to two weeks to
ensure that the moisture content is
almost zero. Low moisture content
contributes to increasing the shelf-life of
their products and sets it apart from
some other virgin coconut oil products.
The time taken to properly dry the oils is
Agriculture has assisted with a new genera-
tor to enable the factory to run its proces-
sors for a full day. Ultimately the factory
hopes to use solar power, to avoid the high
cost of fuel for the generator. Following the
results of the value chain study, CIDP has
also provided technical assistance to assist
in testing and improving Banaban Virgin
Coconut Oil’s products, factory design and
factory layout.
The growth of Banaban Virgin Coconut
Oil is directly benefitting the Banaba people.
“The sale of one sack of coconuts makes a
big difference to families on the island. With
the $15 they can buy cooking items, or
travel over to Savusavu to buy clothes, and
a treat for the children.”
Factory bottling, and sun-drying
Photo credit - Lavinia Kaumaitotoya, PIFON & Mark
Sheehy, Koka Siga
Mr. Osmar C. Benítez, Minister for Agriculture in the
Dominican Republic highlighting the importance of
coconut production in the country
(From page 6)
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A C P - E U C O M M O D I T I E S P R O G R A M M E
(From page 7)
A C P - E U C O M M O D I T I E S P R O G R A M M E
A joint initiative
Implemented by
FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE ACP-EU COMMODITIES PROGRAMME, GO TO:
http://www.acp.int/content/acp-eu-commodities-programme
ACP Secretariat – Avenue Georges Henri 451, B - 1200 - Brussels, Belgium
email : [email protected]
Tel: +32 2 743 06 00
Fax: +32 2 735 55 73
This publication is an initiative of the ACP Secretariat funded by the European Union . Its content is the sole responsibility of the technical
assistance team.
The event served as a platform for pres-
entations and discussions on a well-rounded
selection of subjects around coconut produc-
tion, processing, marketing, packaging and
trade. Structured along the lines of the
“Alliance for Action” methodology (see News-
letter No 1), it contributed to connecting inter-
national and regional experts with stake-
holders from across the coconut value chain to
establish strategic linkages and share informa-
tion and experiences.
Participants learnt of success stories
from the sector in other countries or regions
as a result of the Alliances for Action interven-
tions, and how these could be applied to their
own circumstances. They were updated as re-
gards scientific planting techniques, disease
diagnosis and management, including remedy
and prevention. More generally, they gained
insights on current opportunities and threats in
the coconut industry, at both international and
regional levels.
The conference was followed by two days
of field visits. During the visits, the confer-
ence’s panel of international experts met with
key field actors including coconut lead farm-
ers, processors, and support institutions, in
Alliance areas such as Nagua, Sánchez and
Villa Altagracia. This was an opportunity for a
hands-on demonstration of the points dis-
cussed at the conference. The meetings
took place at various coconut lead farms
and processing facilities to provide diagno-
ses on existing pest and diseases, discuss
possible remedies and prevention meas-
ures, value addition of coconut products
and generally share both international and
local best practices on coconut production,
marketing and trade.
Both the international panel of ex-
perts and the farmer communities from the
region took home precious insights and in-
formation that will contribute to imple-
menting more effective work practices and
achieving better results.
Dr. Wayne Mayrie, from Coconut Industry Board of
Jamaica and Chairperson of NSP, explaining different
causes and solutions of pest and diseases