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Five-year funding from USAID's West Africa Regional Mission is enabling the West and Central African Council for Agricultural Research and Development (CORAF) to undertake crucial reforms to better serve the interests of the people of West and Central Africa.

Food and nutrition insecurity, climate change, gender disparities, high unemployment and mass migration of the continent's youth remain major challenges for the region's states. These issues, and the solutions proposed, are at the heart of CORAF's new 2018-2027 strategy and 2018-2022 operational plan.

African governments, and in particular those in West and Central Africa, intend to rely on agriculture to meet these many challenges.

Research, in their view, is essential to creating the innovations needed to produce the food required to feed a growing population and stimulate the economic growth desired in countries. According to experts, new climate-smart crop varieties, innovative approaches, science and technology are essential to the transformation of agriculture in Africa.

"We have always been aware of the important changes in the national and international development architecture that we needed to realign our priorities with the emerging needs of our populations and partners to better fulfill our core mandate of coordinating agricultural research" says Dr. Abdou Tenkouano, Executive Director of CORAF.

"Most of the work over the last two or three years to sharpen our focus and tools has been aimed at positioning CORAF on a trajectory of results and having a definite impact for the benefit of the people of West and Central Africa".

The current collaboration between CORAF and USAID is part of a new cooperation agreement between the two institutions, known as the Partnership for Agricultural Research, Education and Development in West Africa (PAIRED). This five-year program is divided into three components:

• (a) institutional strengthening;
• (b) technological scale-up;
• (c) increased productivity and availability of quality agricultural inputs.

A considerable part of the first component has been undertaken since 2017. After extensive consultations with partners such as the Ministries of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Rural Development, farmers' organizations, producers and suppliers of agricultural inputs, non-governmental organizations, women's groups, regional and international partners, etc., CORAF has produced an updated Strategic and Operational Plan.

Both documents were approved in November 2017 by the CORAF Board of Directors. CORAD's General Assembly, which meets in Dakar, Senegal from April 10 to 12, 2018, is expected to review and adopt these strategic documents. After this General Assembly, the focus will be on bringing the organization into orbit in terms of sustainable financing and efficient organization.

Why does USAID work with CORAF?

USAID has a long-standing working relationship with CORAF. By supporting CORAF, USAID hopes to enable the institution to better address the complex challenges facing West and Central Africa.

"Our collective responsibility as development actors is to help CORAF renew and reorganize itself to better carry out its mandate in the West African region, where needs have become more complex and pressing," explains Alex Deprez, USAID Mission Director for West Africa.

Over the past two years, USAID has made its expertise available to CORAF's senior experts to support the design of these tools, including integrated knowledge management, communication and marketing and resource mobilization plans.

"We need to support CORAF to equip itself with the human and financial resources to implement the plans once approved and adopted," said the USAID Regional Mission Chief.

About CORAF?

CORAF is an international non-profit association of National Agricultural Research Systems (NARS) from 23 countries covering over forty percent of Africa's population, making it the largest sub-regional research organization on the African continent. It was created in 1987. Prior to this, most NARS were weak and had limited research capacity, generally working in isolation. CORAF's main mandate at the time was to coordinate research and development activities in West and Central Africa. By working together, there is a better chance of developing the groundbreaking, cutting-edge research results needed to unlock the agricultural potential of both regions.

What does CORAF do?

Cutting-edge agricultural innovation through research is at the heart of what CORAF does. The Dakar-based research organization collaborates with national agricultural research systems and regional centers of excellence to effectively tackle cross-cutting, cross-border and regional challenges.

What are some of his achievements?

As part of the USAID-funded West Africa Seed Program ( WASP ) between 2011 and 2016, CORAF helped participating countries adopt harmonized seed regulations to facilitate farmers' access to quality seed, and increased the rate of certified seed produced in the region from 12% to 25%. Business models for agribusinesses are now available, while private and public players are now working together to ensure the scaling-up of seed production and distribution needed to transform agriculture in West Africa.

As part of the World Bank-funded West African Agricultural Productivity Program (WAAPP), CORAF has facilitated the production and dissemination of over 400 technologies since 2008. The WAPP, ranked second best project by the World Bank in 2016, has benefited 9 million people directly and 49 million indirectly.

With many African agricultural researchers nearing retirement, PPAAO has been able to train over 1,000 young researchers to continue advancing the agricultural research agenda in their countries.

Overall, over the 30 years of its existence, CORAF has provided leadership and facilitation support to develop common research objectives in West and Central Africa.

"We don't often say it, but one of CORAF's major successes over the last 30 years has been getting researchers from English-, French- and Portuguese-speaking countries to work together to solve common regional challenges," stresses CORAF's Executive Director.