Stakeholders Assess Agro-Pastoral Competitiveness Programme

The 10th session of the C2D-funded ACEFA held March 27 to evaluate the path covered.

Stakeholders of the programme to improve the competitiveness of family agro-pastoral production (ACEFA) have said the programme in 2013 financed 1,817 projects in the maize, pig and poultry sectors to the tune of FCFA 5.52 billion, extended its tentacles to all the ten regions of the country and deployed effective advisory disposition to 20 additional Divisions. It also recruited and trained 834 new counsellors and supported 3,156 farmer groups.

The balance sheet of 2013 was presented on Thursday March 27 during the project's 10th steering committee meeting in Yaounde chaired by the Secretary General of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Jean Claude Eko'o Akouafance. Besides assessing the path covered, the steering committee meeting was also to chart the way forward for efficiency in the ongoing year.

It emerged from the Thursday's session that efforts are on course to move from the 30 Divisions that the programme covers to 43 before the year ends, recruit 464 new agents and reinforce the functioning of the platform. With the first funding for projects (about 962) of them for phase two of the programme estimated at FCFA 4.2 billion, stakeholders are bracing up to take the number of farmer organisations supported to 10,812.

The programme financed with funds from the French Debt-relief Development Contract, C2D, is government's tool to intensify and modernise family production systems to surmount challenges of food security and job creation. Its activities seek to professionalise production and farmer organisations, modernise the production tools as well as generate jobs.