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By Dr Fina Opio, Executive Director, ASARECA
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Opportunities for sub-regional
collaboration
Fina Opio
Executive Director, ASARECA
ASARECA (Association for Strengthening Agricultural Research in Eastern and Central Africa)
An association of 11 Country NARs in the ECA region
Association cont.
It covers 11 countries namely: Burundi, DR.
Congo, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya,
Madagascar, Rwanda, South Sudan Sudan,
Tanzania and Uganda
It was established in 1994
The Association cont.
It was noted then that:
These countries share boarders and have a lot in
common
The problems and opportunities in most cases cut
across boarders
Hence a need for collective action to avoid
duplication of effort and resources.
Leverage on resources where possible
ASARECAs Mission
To enhance regional collective action in:
agricultural research for development,
extension and
agricultural training and education
To promote:
economic growth,
fight poverty,
eradicate hunger and
enhance sustainable use of resources in Eastern and
Central Africa.
ASARECAs Mission is Aligned to the MDG and
Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development
Programme (CAADP) Goals
This mission highlights ASARECA’s commitment to the:
• Millennium Development Goals to reduce poverty and hunger by half by 2015 and
• To attain CAADP’s target of regional agricultural production growth rate at an annual rate of 6% by 2015
Core functions of ASARECA
1. Develop a shared vision and sub-regional goals
2. Empowerment of end-users to ensure their meaningful
participation in setting priorities
3. Coordinate collective action at the sub-regional level
4. Contribute to improving networking in the sub-region on
research, extension, agricultural training and education
5. Contribute to the development of appropriate knowledge,
methodologies, information and technologies
6. Facilitate the transfer of knowledge, information and
technology
Core functions cont.
6. Mobilize and allocate resources for research, extension,
agricultural training and education through working with
African and International organizations
7. Strengthen capacity for agricultural research for
development, extension, agricultural training and education
8 Facilitate sharing of research outputs and benefits among
national agricultural research systems
- Promotion of economies of
scale
- Identification of sub-regional public
goods
- Ensuring Science &
Technology leads to
Innovations
ASARECA adds value to National Agricultural Research Systems (NARS) through:
ASARECA secretariat takes a coordinating role
Opportunities for collaboration
Identification of regional priorities cutting across
the different countries and
Developing strategies and setting an agenda to
address them through collective action.
Convening the countries to address the regional
problems and sharing responsibilities instead of
duplication – hence leveraging resources.
Opportunities cont.
Being able to respond collectively to emergent
problems and threats.
Enhancing and facilitation of harmonization of
policies across the countries to enhance trade
and other barriers to agricultural development
Enhancing of sharing of knowledge, information
technologies and innovations across the sub-
region – (information and Knowledge hub)
Capacity building, mentoring and opportunities
for learning among the different countries.
Opportunities cont.
Leveraging strengths of strong NARS to build
capacity of other NARS
The case of EAAPP- using center's of Excellence
Effective Partnership Required to Implement CAADP And
Achieve 6% Growth Rate at ECA Regional Level
REGIONAL
LEVEL
SUB-REGIONAL
LEVEL
NATIONAL
LEVEL
AU/NEPAD Regional compact
CAADP
PILLARS I, II III & IV
COMESA Sub-Regional Compact
NATIONAL
FOCAL UNIT National Compact
CAADP
PILLAR IV
FARA Regional Compact
ASARECA Regional Compact
NATIONAL
FOCAL UNIT National Compact
Examples of effective collaborative activities
in ASARECA
Sustainable Intensification of Sorghum legume systems in ECA
•Uganda
•Kenya
• Tanzania
•Sudan
•Eritrea
•Exchange of
sorghum
germplasm
between countries
facilitated
•Sharing of
information and
data on sorghum
has hastened the
time for release of
new varieties
ICRISAT Scientist Dr. Mary Mgonja and
Eritrean breeder Negusse Abraha examine
the sorghum crop at Serere, Uganda
NACO Mtama ! was released in Tanzania
after 1 season of testing. The variety was
accessed from Kenya
Eritrean farmers at Goluj
have accessed sorghum
germplasm and hybrids
from ICRISAT and partner
countries
Outcome of water harvesting on maize and nappier grass
production in drier parts of ECA – the case of Kenya
(Upto 1,600 households pulled out food insecurity & maize
production increased from 0.5t/ha to 3.5 t/h over 3 yrs)
Onion productivity enhanced through drip irrigation and
market creation - Madagascar
Off-season
market-oriented
onion productivity
increased by
between 50-70%
over the last 3
years for 600
farmers
Enhancing access to quality seed potato in ECA
ASARECA is upscaling quality seed
potato production innovations in
ECA
Facilitating the movement of certified
seed between the participating
countries
Exchange of potato germplasm
enhanced
Potato field planted with quality seed
potato at Ngozi, Burundi
The small seed plot techqnique has
been promoted at Meru, Kenya
Small seed-plot for producing quality
potato seed at Kabale, Uganda
Success story of Maize project
ASARECA and its partners (Kenya,
Tanzania, Ethiopia, Uganda and
Sudan) have introgressed drought
tolerance conferring genes into the
Maize
Sudanese Maize transformed with NHX1
gene
Glass house care of transfomats
Ms Rasha Adam invented a
drought tolerant gene & named it ASARECA AnxZm35 gene
Thank you
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