The African Development Bank (AfDB) plan, which aims to increase food production in Africa in order to prevent the impending food crisis brought on by the Russia-Ukraine war, has the backing of the United States Government.
20 million smallholder farmers will have access to wheat, maize, soy, and other staple crop seeds that are certified to be climate-smart, as well as more affordable fertiliser and extension services, thanks to the Bank Group's $1.5 billion African Emergency Food Production Facility, which was approved by its Board of Directors in May.
This would enable Africa to quickly produce an additional 38 million tonnes of food valued at $12 billion over the following four farming seasons.
The commitment was made by US President Joe Biden on Tuesday at the G7 Leaders Summit in Germany. At a summit, President Biden and the other members of the G7 announced a contribution of $4.5 billion, with the United States covering half of that amount.
The Biden administration said that it will contribute $760 million to help those nations that most require it offset the effects of rising food, fuel, and fertiliser prices brought on by war.
Additionally, Biden pledged an additional $2.76 billion in federal financing to safeguard the most vulnerable people on the planet and lessen the effects of the conflict in Ukraine on rising food insecurity and malnutrition.
Notably, these additional contributions will aid initiatives in more than 47 nations and regional bodies, and they will help regional strategies to meet growing demands.
The AfDB's Africa Disaster Risk Financing programme, which aids African governments in addressing severe food insecurity brought on by extreme weather conditions like drought by facilitating access to disaster risk products like drought or flooding insurance, will also receive support from the United States.
In order to increase countries' resilience to climate shocks, the Bank created the programme in 2018. It currently runs in almost a dozen African nations.
While thanking the American government, the president of the AfDB, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina said: “I am delighted about the significant announcement and contributions made by President Joe Biden and fellow G7 leaders, to tangibly support the work of the African Development Bank and to address global food security”.
Dr Adesina pointed out that the U.S. government's multifaceted approach to addressing issues with global food security, which includes funding for some of the AfDB's own ground-breaking initiatives, is a huge boost to their efforts and those of other organisations that are making significant contributions to helping African nations at this particular time of need.
“We warmly and wholeheartedly embrace the support by the United States and other G7 member nations”, he added.
Russia and the Ukraine sell a lot of cereals to Africa. The war has caused a food scarcity of at least 30 million metric tonnes in the continent, especially wheat, maize, and soybeans imported from both countries.
“We warmly and wholeheartedly embrace the support by the United States and other G7 member nations”, he added.
The Roadmap for Global Food Security was introduced at a ministerial gathering on global food security that the United States presided over in May. The roadmap, which received support from 94 nations, reaffirms a commitment to act quickly, widely, and cooperatively in order to meet the critical food security and nutrition requirements of millions of people living in vulnerable circumstances all over the world.
Adesina was one of the meeting's prominent speakers and revealed that the African Development Bank would contribute $1.3 billion of its own funds to the $1.5 billion budget of the African Emergency Food Production Facility.
To meet the challenge, 38 million tonnes of food will be produced as part of the Bank's African Emergency Food Production initiative. 11 million tonnes of wheat, 18 million of maize, 6 million of rice, and 2.5 million of soybeans will be included in this.
Building on the Bank's extraordinary success with its Technologies for African Agricultural Transformation (TAAT) platform, the Facility will expand on it. TAAT, which was established in 2019, provided 1.8 million farmers in seven countries with heat-tolerant wheat seed varieties. Additionally, it raised wheat production by 2.7 million tonnes, adding $840 million in value.
Over the next four farming seasons, the Bank will also offer smallholder farmers more affordable fertiliser by using its convening power with significant fertiliser producers, loan guarantees, provisions for "smart subsidies" for farmers adopting digital technologies, and other financial instruments.
The Facility also seeks to win African governments' support for legislative changes that improve the continent's food value chain's investment and business climate.