The Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) recognises the importance of strengthening finance services for African agricultural transformation. This is even more the case as CAADP enters a new phase of supporting countries with implementation of their respective agricultural investment plans. However, the CAADP partnership currently lacks the expertise, resources and networks now required to adequately support countries in strengthening agri-finance.
Wasafiri Directors, Ian and Liberal worked together on linking MFW4A and CAADP
The Making Finance Work for Africa (MFW4A) partnership is an initiative that is very well-positioned to respond to this need. In 2008, MFW4A defined agricultural finance as a priority, going on in 2011 to produce a policy brief on agricultural finance in Africa and the Kampala Principles, constituting a set of policy actions that are urgently needed to unlock agri-finance in Africa.
The challenge became how to mainstream the Kampala Principles and the policy brief recommendations into the CAADP framework. Wasafiri Consulting was contracted to provide an answer to this question, while building momentum between the two initiatives to combine CAADP’s political strength with MFW4A’s technical expertise to help solve the puzzle of African agri-finance.
The report produced by Wasafiri offered invaluable strategic and operational recommendations, and importantly facilitated mutual understanding and the establishment of an on-going symbiotic relationship between the two partnerships, a pivotal step forward in the quest to meet the financing demands of Africa’s agricultural transformation.
