African leaders urged to prioritise improving food security

Head of Heifer International’s Africa Programmes Adesuwa Ifedi has implored global leaders, innovators, and businesses on the urgent need to improve Africa’s food systems.

Speaking at the recent World Food Forum in Rome, she stressed that the only way to tackle food challenges in Africa is through innovation, teamwork, and better funding.

The World Food Forum 2024, which brought together people from all over the world, focused on making sure everyone has access to good food today and in the future.

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During a panel discussion under the theme From Start-Up to Scale: Pathways to Zero Hunger, Ms Ifedi shared how working together can help introduce new ideas and solutions in farming, particularly in Africa’s rural areas.

Heifer International has worked with small-scale farmers for over 80 years—50 of those in Africa. According to Ms Ifedi, their experience shows that helping farmers adopt new technologies and ideas is critical to improving agriculture.

One-way Heifer does this is by acting as a link between innovators and farmers. They introduce new ideas to farmers, gather feedback to improve those ideas and help spread them widely across communities.

Ms Ifedi stressed that solving farming challenges requires working together. She said: “We can’t solve problems alone. Everyone needs to be connected and work as one system.” For real progress, innovators, development organisations, and funders must join forces, especially in areas where resources are limited."

A big challenge, she noted, is how to combine the best of both local knowledge and global expertise. Local innovators understand the needs of their communities but often don’t have access to the latest technologies.

On the other hand, global innovators have access to advanced technologies but may not fully understand local farming conditions.

The solution, Ms Ifedi explained, is to get local and global innovators to work together. By doing so, they can combine their strengths and create solutions that better serve African farmers.

She also pointed out that funding for agriculture needs to change. Traditional ways of funding are often too limited and don’t take enough risks.

She suggested that creative and collaborative financing is needed to support innovative ideas, especially those aimed at helping small-scale farmers.

One success story she shared was Heifer’s partnership with Hello Tractor, a startup that connects farmers with tractor services.

Through Heifer’s AYuTe Africa NextGen initiative, Hello Tractor was able to grow and reach more farmers, thanks to catalytic funding—a type of investment that helps test and scale innovative ideas.

The AYuTe Africa NextGen initiative, launched in 2021, aims to support young African entrepreneurs who are creating solutions for farming challenges. The program provides funding, support, and mentoring to help these young innovators succeed.

Ms Ifedi lauded the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) for promoting teamwork among different stakeholders in agriculture. She expressed hope for a future where organizations, governments, and businesses work together to share knowledge and resources, helping Africa’s farmers grow and succeed.