regional strategic analysis and knowledge support system for southern africa (resakss-sa) 1 st...

Regional Strategic Analysis and Knowledge Support System for

Southern Africa (ReSAKSS-SA)

1st Meeting of the ReSAKSS-SA Steering CommitteePretoria, South Africa

31 July, 2007

http://www.iwmi.cgiar.org/africa/index.asp

Strategic Analysis and Knowledge Support System for Southern Africa (SAKSS-SA)

Objectives

• To review the strategic directions that ReSAKSS-SA is currently undertaking – its current agenda and operational structure – and determine if there are any mid-term corrections that need to be made

• Review of progress since October 2006, reflecting on who is doing the work? Are the current arrangements working? Are the modalities to generate and deliver results the right ones? How can they be improved?

• Discuss partnership building, collaboration and leveraging of resources and lessons learned within the region and beyond

Regional Strategic Analysis and Knowledge Support System for

Southern Africa (ReSAKSS-SA)

Status, progress to date and future outlook

1st Meeting of the ReSAKSS-SA Steering CommitteePretoria, South Africa

31 July, 2007



Why ReSAKSS?

• An Africa wide initiative supporting CAADP and regionally shared goals – SADC RISDP, COMESA, ECOWAS by providing knowledge support for planning, review and policy dialogue for agricultural growth and poverty reduction

• Set up by CGIAR centers in collaboration with national, regional and international partners


ReSAKSS-SA aims to

• support review and learning processes to ensure successful implementation of rural and agricultural development strategies (CAADP & SADC RISDP)

• inform policy dialogue on the design and implementation of development strategies at regional and national level (e.g. CAADP country round table process)

• promote evidence and outcomes based policy and decision making for the agricultural sector in southern Africa


Why does poverty persist in southern Africa? • MDG No. 1 calls for

reducing the proportion of people living on less than US$1 a day by half.

• SSA, in particular southern Africa is making limited progress. Why?

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Why does agricultural growth lag in southern Africa?

• CAADP vision by 2015: “Improve productivity of agriculture to attain an average annual growth rate of 6% especially focusing on small-scale farmers”

• SADC Regional Indicative Strategic Dev Plan (RISDP) shares same vision

• How can we double agricultural growth in southern Africa?

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SADC Agricultural GDP growth rate


What sorts of investments can achieve pro-poor growth?

• Maputo Declaration 2003: “commit ourselves to allocating at least 10% of national budgetary resources (to agriculture) within five years”

• Why some countries not allocating the 10%?

• If agricultural budgets double, and in some countries triple, how can we assure these investments achieve a high payoff?

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Evolution of ReSAKSS-SA• February 2005 - Regional

stakeholders meeting

• March 2005 - Endorsed as CAADP Early Action

• April 2005… – Inventory of regional capacities (policy, poverty & spatial data) and dialogue with stakeholders

• April 2006- Regional Coordinator appointed

• October, 2006 – ReSAKSS-SA launched, and agreement on governance and regional priorities for work plans


Developing Partnerships


ReSAKSS-SA team

• 1 Regional Coordinator - P. Chilonda• 1 Principal Economist – ICRISAT (70%) – I.

Minde• 2 Post Doctoral Fellows

– Monitoring Agriculture Sector Performance – F. Olubode-Awosola (1 May, 2007)

– Modeling sources of agricultural growth– Y. Tesfamariam Bhata (to join on 15 August 2007)

• 1 Research assistant – Phillipa Kanyoka (50%)

• Other IWMI, IFPRI and ICRISAT staff contributing


Time frame and Budgets

• 2005 & 2006 - USAID provided seed funding ($200K per annum)

• 2007-2009; US$900K for 2007 – (USAID, - $400K; DFID & SIDA - $500K)– 2008 - $780K; 2009 - $600K

• Mozambique SAKSS – 2007; $392K


Work plan and common agenda

• Strategic analysis initiative targeting assessment of policy & investment options for accelerating agricultural growth

• Knowledge management and sharing initiative for promoting evidence and outcome based policy and strategy planning

• Capacity strengthening to build capacity in the region to conduct analysis


Progress to date


Initial operational thrusts

• Increasing the awareness of ReSAKSS-SA in the region

• Expanding the ReSAKSS-SA network of partners

• Implementing activities in the workplan


Increasing awareness and partnership building• Meetings held with SADC,

NEPAD, COMESA, donors (USAID, SIDA) to further refine work plan

• Participated in Africa-wide ReSAKSS coordination meetings to develop an integrated agenda across the ReSAKSS nodes

• Shared work plan with stakeholders at various meetings in region

• Held brainstorming workshop with potential partners from the region

• Began to develop collaborative partnerships with national, regional and international institutions


Network of partners• CGIAR Centers: ICRISAT, IWMI and IFPRI

• Regional institutions: NEPAD, SADC-FANR, COMESA, FANRPAN, SAHIMS, SARPN, EIS-AFRICA, HSRC

• Pilot countries: Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia

• National institutions: universities, government policy units, statistics units, NARS

• External institutions: FAO, MSU

Principle is to mobilize the best available expertise to provide the highest quality analytical and advisory services to countries and SADC-FANR/COMESA


Strategic analysis1. Monitoring and evaluating progress of

targeted agricultural growth, poverty reduction and public sector investments

2. Region-wide options for accelerating agricultural growth and poverty reduction

3. Options for increasing agricultural productivity


Activity 1: Monitoring and evaluating progress of targeted agricultural growth, poverty reduction and public sector investments• Identifying existing data

and priorities to support CAADP/SADC RISDP – indicators, SADC AIMS

• Strategic reviews of agricultural growth trends

• Tracking public spending in agriculture (Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia)


Initial outputs


Activity 2 & 3

• Expert consultation on regional analysis to review and refine research agenda, 19-20 February, 2007

• To improve the integrate of the two activities so as to produce a major report to inform agriculture growth options in the region

• Agreed that main output => options for accelerating agricultural growth in southern Africa

• Defined the studies with intermediate outputs to contribute to major report.


Activity 2: Region-wide options for accelerating agricultural growth and poverty reduction

• Identifying challenges and opportunities of regional integration for economic growth (spatial characterization, capital and labour flows, summary interpretation of opportunities/ challenges)

• Optimal regional integration paths for different countries – formal modeling approaches, 2008 (policy brief – interim product)

• Assessment of alternative regional research and development strategies (still under discussion)


Atlas Objective• The purpose of this exercise is to understand the spatial constraints and

opportunities for growth and trade potential in the region. More specific objectives are to:– Establish a database on key production and trade conditions, suitable for use

within a geographic information system (GIS). – Using a sub-regional approach analyze infrastructure and other investment

priorities by discipline, commodity, zone, and country, considering the comparative agricultural production advantages and trade opportunities.

– Provide an organizational framework for the economic model simulations, according to which both inputs and outputs will be assembled.

• The data review and analysis should allow a wide range of issues to be examined, leading to: – The identification of where untapped production potentials could be unlocked by

productivity or access-enhancing investments– The identification of where potential for cross-border trade is largest (i.e. where

areas of production surplus and deficit are in geographical proximity)– It will be useful to also determine how regional investment strategies could be

improved by regional cooperation and integration.


CONTENTS

+ People and Places

+ Agricultural Production

+ Biophysical Characteristics

+ Infrastructure

+ Trade Potential

+ Welfare and Wellbeing


People and Places• National & sub-

national administrative boundaries

• Population centers• Urban areas• Total Population• Rural population• Total population

density• Rural population

density• Urban population

density• Roads

CONTENTS


Biophysical Characteristics

• Length of growing period• Average annual rainfall• Rainfall variability [mean

monthly rainfall]• Landcover• Elevation• Farming system• Livestock farming

system• Cropland intensity• Pasture intensity

CONTENTS


Agricultural Production• Livestock population

– Cattle– Goats– Sheep– Poultry

• Crop production – Maize– Wheat– Rice– Sorghum– Millet– Potatoes– Cassava– Beans– Soyabeans– groundnuts, …)

CONTENTS


Activity 3: Options for increasing agricultural productivity

• a) Key policy briefs on alternative policy and investment options for improving productivity – subsidies, contract farming and irrigation under preparation

• b) Salient features affecting the performance of regional agricultural research collaboration (planned for 2008)

• c) Monitoring of non-tariff barriers in regional agricultural trade– Intra-regional linkages for expanded grain

trade in southern Africa (MSU and partners in Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia) – December, 2007


Knowledge management & sharing• Promote evidence and

outcome based policy and strategy planning

• Monitoring of key indicators related to agricultural growth, poverty reduction and investments (CAADP/SADC RISDP)

• Along with collaborators, build capacity in the region for analyzing agricultural & related data


Establishing the ReSAKSS-SA ICT platform – www.resakss-sa.org


Analytical framework for the SADC agricultural information management system (AIMS)

• Participated in meeting organized by SADC on AIMS – March, 2007

• Preparing document describing indicators to monitor agricultural growth (CAADP/SADC RISDP) – base document for developing database – draft available for comment

• Concept note for development of AIMS prototype under preparation with ZADI/CTA, Germany


Capacity building & Support to countries• Pilot countries - Malawi, Mozambique and

Zambia• Mozambique – leveraged additional

funding from SIDA ($392k)– Provide strategic analysis and information

support in the decision making process in the agricultural sector in Mozambique

– Provide an effective platform for policy dialogue based on results of credible research and analysis

• Malawi – MASIP, Bunda College of Agric, Univ. of Malawi

• Zambia – ACF, MACO and MSU/FSRP


Future outlook - I

• Strengthen collaborative linkages with regional and national institutions

• Focus on strategic analysis & knowledge management and sharing with a strong capacity building element

• Implement the programme components through the 4 interrelated activities

• Strengthen outreach and communication strategy


Future outlook II

• Local and regional partners, in particular SADC and COMESA will increasingly– rely on ReSAKSS-SA on kinds of value added

products for supporting design and implementation of strategy

– Use information and analysis platform as key inputs into policy dialogue about future priorities for agriculture

• Increasing local partners capacity to apply more advanced tools and approaches on future options for agricultural investments and policies


Key issues - 1

• Focus areas/agenda– Maintain the 3 areas, taking care of the balance

• Strategic analysis– Strategically involve stakeholders in the process

• Activity 1– Contribute to AIMS – reporting of key indicators

• Activity 2– Role of agriculture in regional integration– More emphasis on trade? – SACAU


Key issues - 2

• Activity 3– Broaden list topics to include 1)

improving access to inputs by smallholder farmers; 2) biofuels ; 3) climate change and disaster mgt??


Key issues - 3

• Knowledge management – Allocate more staff time

• Capacity building– Comparative advantage/ on job training

• Steering committee/Board? One page needed next meeting

• SC/Board members to input into drafting of agenda

• Inclusion of South Africa in SC – (Chair)


Key issues - 4

• Implementation – Emphasis on demand driven agenda will

improve implementation (SADC RISDP/COMESA, Members, ReSAKSS)

• Strengthen outreach and communication strategy – Need to target key events in the region

to provide information that might be needed

regional strategic analysis and knowledge support system for southern africa (resakss-sa) 1 st...

Documents

particular southern

knowledge support system

regional strategic analysis

africa wide initiative

strategic directions

agricultural growth

agricultural sector

agricultural budgets