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CORAF and its implementing partners of the Strengthening Networks and Institutional Capacities in Plant Breeding for the Development of Resilient Crops to Meet the Needs of West African Farmers (ABEE) project held their annual meeting in Dakar, Senegal, from November 21 to 23, 2022. 

The main aim of the annual sharing workshop is to enable the various partners to take stock of the progress made in achieving results, and to identify prospects for implementing the project.

• Read also: ABEE project performance highlights from 2020 to 2021

However, this year's meeting, which marks the third year of the project's implementation, places particular emphasis on a reorientation of activities in the face of the constraints encountered, notably the COVID-19 pandemic and delays in budget disbursements.

"Immediately after the official launch of the project in February 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic was declared and countries put in place response arrangements including containment and travel restrictions, which seriously hampered certain activities such as face-to-face meetings and the setting up of demonstration plots," says Dr Ousmane NDOYE, ABEE Project Coordinator at CORAF.

"In addition, there have been some delays in disbursements to project partners due to certain constraints, which has also slowed down the implementation of various field activities under the project," he added.

For the partners, this meant reflecting on and proposing solutions to the challenges identified, and drawing up a roadmap for reorienting activities accordingly. 

"Some of the corrective actions discussed to meet the challenges and catch up include increasing the number of trials to be carried out per crop and per country, and also capitalizing on the mid-term review to propose rearrangements in activities and budgets", confides the ABEE Project Coordinator.

Among the other achievements of the 2022 annual meeting of ABEE project implementation partners, we can note that the project's progress in terms of objectives and results achieved was discussed, and that the financial status was presented along with the performance of the project's indicators and communication system.

ABEE is a regional project implemented under the coordination of CORAF in Burkina Faso, Niger and Senegal. 

Implementing partners include the Institut de l'environnement et de recherches agricoles du Burkina Faso (INERA), the Institut national de la recherche agronomique au Niger (INRAN) and the Institut sénégalais de recherche agricole (ISRA), with technical support from the Centre de coopération internationale en recherche agronomique pour le développement (CIRAD) and the Integrated Breeding Platform (IBP) represented in the consortium by AfricaRice.

ABEE is a project of the European Union's Development of Intelligent Innovation through Research in Agriculture (DeSIRA) initiative. 

While the DeSIRA initiative has more than ten projects, CORAF is currently implementing three (03). 

In addition to the ABEE project, these include the Biorisks project and the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Program ex-Pillar 4 (CAADP-XP4).