Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, young entrepreneurs in agrifood systems in sub-Saharan Africa were already facing a number of challenges. The main challenges include limited access to natural resources, finance, technology, knowledge and information, and insufficient participation in policy dialogues and other decision-making processes. The COVID-19 pandemic and its disruptions to agricultural value chains are presenting additional hurdles for these agripreneurs. Without focused and appropriately designed response interventions addressing their specific constraints and contexts, it is increasingly observed that some of the policy responses and measures put in place by governments to halt the spread of the virus are exacerbating the existing challenges that the youth are facing in engaging in agrifood systems. For example, several formal and informal micro, small and medium-sized agribusinesses that employ many young people, have been forced to close or downscale significantly as a result of lockdowns and movement restrictions at national and local levels. FAO, together with other members of the United Nations Inter-Agency Network on Youth Development (IANYD), has called for effective and safe partnerships with young people during and after the COVID-19 crisis to ensure that government and development partners’ response measures are inclusive of youth’s needs.
In this webinar, the discussion focuses on the need to promote appropriate agricultural technologies and innovations that will help agribusinesses in Africa to be resilient in the wake of the COVID 19 pandemic.
Despite efforts over recent years to improve the status of agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa, little change has been noted, due partially to the fact that efforts have come from individual entities, which had short-term funding or lacked the necessary expertise...
La crise économique et sanitaire due à la Covid-19 interpelle les trajectoires de reconfiguration des systèmes alimentaires en République du Congo. Elle questionne la capacité des mesures de régulation prises par les pouvoirs publics et des stratégies d’adaptation des acteurs...
This policy paper provides a macro-level picture of youth’s inability to access agriculture finance, and provides six major recommendations to policy makers: 1) promote financial literacy for youth 2) enhance the capability of financial institutions to assess agricultural sector opportunities;...
Malgré les efforts déployés ces dernières années pour améliorer la situation de l’agriculture en Afrique subsaharienne, peu de changements ont été observés. Cet insuccès est dû, en partie, au fait que ces efforts ont été consentis par diverses entités de...