Report Food Security Partners Day

From Aid to Trade: Enhancing Effective and Proactive Partnerships in Food Production Value Chain  

On 24th October 2017, the Embassy of the Kingdom of The Netherlands in Nairobi organised a Food Security Partners' Day themed “From Aid to Trade: Enhancing Effective and Proactive Partnerships in Food Production Value Chain”. The goal of the Partners' Day was to provide a platform for interaction, build new and strengthen existing alliances.

The topics covered during the day were inclusivity and scalability. Inclusivity and scalability are relevant topics in the context of the Aid to Trade transition spearheaded by Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Nairobi. The ambition with the Aid to Trade agenda is that the Embassy will cease to directly manage development projects and focus on strengthening trade relations with Kenya. There were two sessions during the Partners' day; morning and afternoon sessions. The morning session covered an overview of the development cooperation and funding instruments by the Netherlands Governments; followed by presentations and plenary discussion on inclusive models and approaches; achieving scale for food security. To share practical experiences a panel discussion followed the presentations. During the entire day there was market place exhibition of projects supported by the Embassy.

During the afternoon session there were two world café discussions on inclusivity and scalability. The goals of these discussions were to come up with practical ways focusing on policy, design and implentation to ensure inclusivity and scalability in the aid to trade agenda.

During the world café sessions the role of policy in promoting inclusivity and scalability through PPPs was recognized. The policy environment should inform the strategic areas to intervene. In the design of inclusive projects/interventions private sector and financial partners should be included to ensure successful scale up of the intervention. Intervention design should aspire to transform subsistence farmers to commercial farmers, while taking a value chain approach. Government plays a critical role in sector transformation and should be involved from design to implementation.

To sum up the day, seven key success factors of inclusivity and scalability were identified;

 Inclusivity and scalability initiatives need solid and diverse partnerships from the design to implementation.
 For change to happen in the value chains, all stakeholders must be able to benefit (financially or otherwise).
 Innovation in the sector does not come free, hence the need for subsidy for the bottom of the pyramid.
 There is need to fix the disconnect that exists in the various components and actors of the value chain as has been successfully implemented in countries such as the Netherlands through the Dutch Growth Diamond.
 Self-regulation by farmers is important to ensure reinforcement of quality and standards.
 Clustering of farmers, services and initiatives is important for scale.
 In the design of projects, starting with the business perspective and then developing it further in the spirit of Aid to Trade is sustainable.

Read the full report here.