Faced with a growing population and more frequent climate shocks, as well as the impact of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, agriculture and food systems across sub-Saharan Africa are becoming increasingly insecure. But localisation and better dialogue could challenge this trend.
On 29 July 2021, Research Fellow at the Economic and Social Research Foundation in Tanzania, Agatha Kiama, Senior Economist at the National Agricultural Marketing Council in South Africa, Dr Ndumiso Mazibuko, and former Secretary-General of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, Hon. Sindiso Ngwenya, joined Richard King of Chatham House for the final AFRICAP webinar. They discussed opportunities and challenges in policy and practice for sustainable agriculture and resilient food systems.
Key messages
Researchers left the audience with three main messages:
- Better coordination and communication is required between stakeholders to achieve sustainable goals.
- More evidence of ‘what works and why’ is needed to strengthen resilience.
- Engagement must move beyond policymakers and extend to practitioners, young people, and the private sector.
Following presentations from Agatha Kiama and Ndumiso Mazibuko, Sindiso Nwgenya was able to draw on his extensive experience to offer his take on their research, and Richard King facilitated a rich discussion from the audience Q&A.
This event was the final one in the GCRF-AFRICAP seminar series which launched in January 2019. Thank you to everyone who presented, chaired and participated throughout this period.
As the programme draws to a close in March 2022, we will be running events to showcase our final programme outputs on food systems and climate resilience in sub-Saharan Africa – most notably iFEED, an evidence base designed to help decision-makers identify policy pathways to a climate-smart, food-and nutrition-secure future for Africa. For more information on these events, visit the GCRF-AFRICAP events page.
Presenter slides
You can also view or download the presenter slides from the webinar.