The future: towards agenda 2063.

This chapter discusses the foreseeable future of agriculture in Africa, which has a major contribution to make in terms of food security, and also in terms of economic, social and environmental development. The changing climate in Africa already calls for the adoption of the best alternative agricultural production strategy that can deliver both productivity and ecosystem services. This chapter also highlights important findings from the book such as the new expertise and experience in Conservation Agriculture (CA) that has been gained, especially during the last decade. Research, training, farmer innovation and the increasing agricultural investments in institution building mean that CA now holds greater promise of serving as a sustainable pillar in the implementation of Agenda 2063. Also included in this chapter is a transcription of the speech of the Director General of the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF), Mr Mzamo Michael Mlenganaduring during the official opening of the Congress, wherein he called for a greater contribution by CA and the multi-stakeholder CA community of practice towards Agenda 2063.

Conservation agriculture in Africa: climate smart agricultural development

This book is about Conservation Agriculture (the use of no tillage systems) to preserve soil structure and integrity. It has become an increasingly important step towards sustainable farming. This publication brings together conservation agriculture and climate smart decision making processes for the first time, focusing on Africa. This book brings to the fore scientific and empirical evidence about Conservation Agriculture in Africa, articulated by the Second Africa Congress on Conservation Agriculture (2ACCA) held in Johannesburg in 2018. It describes how farmers in Africa are successfully adopting Conservation Agriculture as an alternative to the unsustainable conventional farming practices and as a solution to loss of agricultural productivity, soil erosion and land degradation, climate change challenges and ever-increasing food insecurity. This work discusses how Conservation Agriculture can support the implementation of the African Union's Malabo Declaration and Agenda 2063 which calls for climate smart agricultural development. It provides development-oriented case studies and scientific evidence relevant to all stakeholders in the public, private and civil sectors who are engaged in building policy, institutional and human capacity to accelerate the mainstreaming of Conservation Agriculture across Africa.

The Malabo Declaration and agenda 2063: making climate smart agriculture real with conservation agriculture in Africa.

The African Union (AU) has provided the vision and even a hint of the future through Agenda 2063: The Africa We Want, to be achieved, in part, through accelerated agricultural growth and transformation, leading to shared prosperity and improved livelihoods. The promulgation is contained in the Malabo Declaration of the AU Summit held in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, in June 2014. Attaining the ambitious commitments of ending hunger, doubling productivity, halving post-harvest losses and poverty, enhancing resilience in livelihoods and production systems to climate variability and other shocks, and reducing child stunting to 10% and numbers of underweight children to 5% by 2025 requires a definition of the strategies and the operative paradigms. The Declaration also calls for African agriculture to become climate smart. This chapter presents the strategic positioning of Conservation Agriculture (CA) in making climate smart agriculture (CSA) real in Africa and harnessing partnerships, informed by science and analyses of lessons from past interventions. We conclude that investing US$50 per household, in a capacity development programme in CA for 25 million households, has the potential to increase land productivity, produce food surpluses and transform livelihoods, thus attaining the Malabo Declaration targets. The investment in and adoption of CA-based CSA to that magnitude will not only move Africa's agriculture to a new level, where a significant proportion of agricultural land is managed with CA systems, but also supply competitively priced raw materials for transformative industrial and economic growth in Africa.

Mainstreaming of the conservation agriculture paradigm in Africa.

This chapter provides a justification for mainstreaming Conservation Agriculture (CA) in Africa. It describes the rationale for total transformation of agriculture that is needed in the future. Mainstreaming CA requires not only nation-wide adoption of the new paradigm of agriculture but also the necessary policy and institutional alignment to ensure that CA maintains its quality and full range of benefits to the farmers and to society. CA is a core component of climate smart agriculture and has been endorsed by the Malabo Declaration and Agenda 2063 for agricultural development. Thus, it is essential that everything possible is done by all stakeholders to support the implementation of Agenda 2063 with CA at its core. The chapter elaborates five major areas of change that are necessary to create the appropriate conditions for mainstreaming CA in Africa.

Africa, 2030 Agenda and Agenda 2063

The hierarchical state-led model of governance that is used to address global policy issues has proved to be wanting on sustainable development. This chapter discusses the concept of transnational governance of sustainable development, focusing on the United Nations 2030 Agenda and Agenda 2063 in Africa. The premise is that implementation of the two agendas represents an enormous challenge to African governments in terms of resources, extent, and urgency. The chapter will make a reasonable case that transnational governance is required for active engagement of non-state actors and relevant institutions to mobilize resources to support the effective implementation and monitoring of the 2030 Agenda and Agenda 2063 in Africa.

The IMF or the AMF: Defining the Future of Financing for Investment and Development Projects in Africa

Since independence the government of many African countries have depended on the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank as their main sources of finance for major developmental and investment projects in their respective countries. Accordingly, besides the granting of loans to Low Income Countries (LICs) at zero interest rate, the IMF also assists member countries to resolve their balance of payment challenges as well as granting interest-bearing loans to both member and non-member countries. Similarly, the African Monetary Fund (AMF) which is a prototype of the IMF was created by the African Union (AU) and is not yet operational. Just like the IMF, the AMF is intended to fund major developmental projects in Africa. This article examines the IMF loans conditionality and the award of Special Drawing Rights (SDR) to African Countries as seen during the COVID-19 crisis. It argues that the AMF would not be the African countries’ panacea as far as funding for developmental projects in Africa is concerned. In this regard, the article further examines Agenda 2063 as a future development model for Africa, as well as the various sources of project finance as envisioned in the Frameworks Document of Agenda 2063. It concludes that IMF still has the financial muscle to fund developmental projects and resolved balance of payment problems in Africa despite alternative sources of finance recommended by Agenda 2063.

Discourse on Pedagogy between Academy and the Public

This theoretical paper reviews the current theory about curriculum transformation and renewal in higher education in Africa and, in particular, South Africa. Although the findings are applicable to different universities, the pedagogical approach of North-West University will be the focus. The aim is to understand curriculum responsiveness pertaining to decolonisation and sustainable development that can align with the African Union’s proposed Agenda 2063. The epistemology is from a practical public theological paradigm. A single-system research method has been followed to integrate current research about tertiary education curriculum transformation with the latest practice theory. Three different aspects are explored, namely how Agenda 2063 is applicable to higher education in a post-colonial context, the fibre of human relations based on Nagy’s contextual theory, and the curriculum as a powerful tool for change. The paper concludes that lecturers and students can join forces in growing towards the Africa they want by active experiential student-centred pedagogy.

Pan-Africanism in the 21st century: African union and the challenges of cooperation and integration in Africa

The paper examines the extent to which Pan-Africanism and Pan-African vision of promoting African unity, cooperation and integration has been achieved under the African Union (AU) in the 21st century. It also assesses the challenges of cooperation and integration under the AU. The paper adopted a qualitative approach, while data was gathered from secondary sources and analysed thematically. It notes that the quest for African cooperation and integration is not new, but dates back to philosophy and vision of Pan-Africanism and Pan-African movement from the 1950s and 1960s. This movement later took roots in the continent and championed the struggle of Africans and peoples of African descent for emancipation and the restoration of their dignity, against slavery, colonialism and all forms of racism and racial exploitation, and to overcome developmental challenges. After independence, the Pan-African movement found concrete expression in the establishment of the Organization of Africa Unity (OAU) in 1963, and later transformed to the African Union (AU) in 2002. These continental organisations have served at platforms for the pursuit of Africa cooperation and integration and addressing post-independence challenges with varying successes. The paper revealed that AU’s Pan-African agenda in the 21st century including the African Economic Community (AEC), AU Agenda 2063, and the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), are not without challenges. Addressing these challenges holds the key to achieving the continental goal of unity and achieving the vision and goals pan-Africanism in the 21st century in Africa.

Looking at Agenda 2063

How does a continent plan for its future? When the African Union convened for its 24th Ordinary Assembly in 2015, they created a blueprint. Agenda 2063 is both a plan for developmentand a snapshot of how Africa should be by 2063. But is it realistic, and most importantly, will it work?