Africa Fertilizer Financing Mechanism Board of Directors to support the entity’s resource mobilization efforts | African Development Bank

The Governing Council of the Africa Fertilizer Financing Mechanism (AFFM) has committed to mobilize funds to implement the AFFM’s Strategic Plan 2022 – 2028 in support of the greater availability and appropriate use of fertilizers on the continent.

Eleven institutional members of the Governing Council participated in a hybrid meeting held on 17 March 2023 at the Bank’s headquarters in Abidjan. These were the African Union Commission; Food and Agriculture Organization; International Fertilizer Development Center; the African Export and Import Bank; Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa; International Fertilizer Association; the Norwegian Development Cooperation Agency; the Pan-African Farmers Organization; Zimbabwe Ministry of Agriculture; the African Development Bank; and the AFFM Secretariat.

The AFFM strategic plan 2022-2028 prioritizes broadening access to finance through capital investment and policy reform. Technical assistance will also be provided to promote smallholder access and proper use of fertilizers.

Councilors congratulated the AFFM on successfully delivering trade credit guarantee projects in Nigeria, Tanzania, Ghana and Ivory Coast.

Through the end of 2022, trade credit guarantees totaling $8.8 million provided leverage of 5.3 times, enabling 112,268 tons of fertilizer to be provided to 690,896 smallholder farmers in the four countries. Under these projects, 97 SMEs gained access to finance, and 138 companies, including fertilizer suppliers, hub agro dealers and aggregators, and 20,987 small farmers benefited from capacity building

To scale up its trade credit guarantee investments, the AFFM has developed a pipeline of projects for implementation in 2023. These will be rolled out in Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania.

The Board has approved the AFFM annual report 2022 and the work program and budget for 2023.

Beth Dunford, the African Development Bank’s vice president for agriculture, human and social development, said AFFM is one of the important means of achieving the bank’s goals. Feed Africa Strategy goals. “It is no surprise that AFFM has been instrumental in supporting the implementation of the bank’s African Emergency Food Production Facility. I am proud to say that the bank has mobilized our agricultural expertise to roll out facility programs in 24 African countries.”

Ahead of the 2023 Africa Fertilizer and Soil Health Summit (AFSH), scheduled for June and July 2023 in Dakar, Senegal, Amb. Josefa Sacko, African Union Commissioner for Agriculture, Rural Development, Blue Economy and Environmental Sustainability and Chair of the AFFM Governing Council, said AFFM should be strengthened to support the implementation of the decisions that will emerge from the summit. Janet Ademe, head of the Rural Development Department at the African Union Commission, spoke about Amb. On behalf of Sacko.

The processes of sustainable production, distribution, use and management of fertilizers and soil health are crucial to the transformation of African agriculture. All of these demand that AFFM take up its role of having appropriate financing tools in place, allowing the private sector to invest, and that our farmers access and properly use this important input in African agriculture.