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"It's time we recalibrated OneCGIAR's reforms in Africa, to better take into account all of Africa's priorities and concerns," said the President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Dr. Akinwumi ADESINA, at a high-level event held in Abidjan on May 18-19, 2022, which brought together key players in Africa's agricultural sector.

The aim of the event was to reflect on OneCGIAR 's reforms and ensure that they are aligned with the continent's realities and priorities.  

OneCGIAR is the culmination of a transformation process begun by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) in June 2018. 

The aim of this transformation is to better adapt CGIAR interventions to the current and future challenges facing agriculture in poor countries, notably the food, land, water and climate crises, which are all interconnected.

However, it is imperative that these reforms help the African continent achieve its goals of food security and poverty eradication, warn the continent's stakeholders. 

"As the CGIAR reforms, it must keep in mind that the goal in Africa is not to increase the number of technologies, but to get them to farmers, on a scale of millions. [...] We need to feed Africa, and there's no time to lose. The CGIAR must therefore be held accountable for helping to achieve Zero Hunger", declared Dr Akinwumi ADESINA, reminding us in passing that there were only eight (08) years left to achieve the second Sustainable Development Goal - Zero Hunger.

To achieve this, the reforms must not weaken the CGIAR Centers in Africa, he pleaded.

On the contrary, they should favor a more inclusive, institutional approach, in place of the programmatic approach adopted in the past, which he believes has proved counter-productive.

OneCGIAR High-Level Meeting: Speech by Dr Akinwumi ADESINA, President of the AfDB Group

Acting more together, less alone

Concurring, CORAF Executive Director Dr Abdou TENKOUANO called for the adoption of new business models. 

In a presentation focusing on "Strengthening linkages, coordination and accountability in Africa's agricultural research and innovation system", he argued that, given the complexity and entanglement of today's agricultural challenges, these new business models centered on partnerships and always with farmers as the ultimate targets, will promote synergies and the pooling of resources, for a more massive impact.

"All the disruptive elements currently affecting agriculture are interconnected and converge, with an impact on agricultural and food systems and a domino effect on several other sectors, with a wide geographical reach", said Dr TENKOUANO.

"Borderless problems call for borderless solutions. No single country has the capacity to solve all of today's agricultural problems. But when we work together, harnessing and contextualizing OneCGIAR's contribution to reinforce the African agenda as crystallized by the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP), we are capable of doing so," he emphasized.

Dr TENKOUANO made his presentation on behalf of the organizations implementing CAADP ex-Pillar 4 (CAADP-XP4).

These are, in addition to CORAF, the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA), the African Forum for Agricultural Advisory Services (AFAAS), the Association for Strengthening Agricultural Research in Eastern and Central Africa (ASARECA), and the Coordination Centre for Agricultural Research and Development for Southern Africa (CCARDESA).

OneCGIAR high-level meeting: Presentation by Dr Abdou TENKOUANO, CORAF Executive Director

Capitalize on what already exists

Moreover, noting the importance of the local context, CORAF's Executive Director called for the OneCGIAR reforms to adopt an inclusive approach, responding to the demands and needs of farmers and communities.

Above all, he stressed the need to build on the strength of existing institutions.

To illustrate his point, he referred to the network of National Specialization Centers, including two (02) Regional Centers of Excellence(CNS/CRE), set up by CORAF as part of the West African Agricultural Productivity Program(PPAAO), which have generated hundreds of agricultural technologies and innovations that have benefited the countries of the sub-region, based on the pooling and sharing of technologies and knowledge.

Funded by the World Bank, the WAPP has enabled the establishment of CNS/CREs in nine (09) West African countries, taking into account the comparative advantages of each host country in the field of specialization.

"It's obvious that there are potential synergies between the CNS/CRE and the CGIAR centers, depending on their respective areas of specialization. These are therefore avenues for collaboration that should be favored by OneCGIAR, for greater impact on populations", explains Dr. TENKOUNAO.

For his part, the AfDB President called for reforms to be structured around one of the continent's most successful programs: the "Technologies for Transforming African Agriculture"(TAAT) program.

Funded by the AfDB and an integral part of its ten-year strategy Feeding Africa (2016-2025), the TAAT program has achieved convincing and unprecedented results in Africa, according to Dr. ADESINA. 

"OneCGIAR reforms in Africa should be built explicitly around the TAAT program, to take results to even larger scales and set up a system of accountability, to deliver technologies to millions of farmers, using results-based funding," he said. 

The high-level event was co-organized by the AfDB, the African Union Commission (AUC), FARA and OneCGIAR.

In addition to the organizers, the meeting was attended by several African government authorities and other regional organizations such as the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), the Regional Forum of Universities for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM) and the African Union Development Agency (AUDA-NEPAD).