Rome, 29 April 2010 – African governments, donors and the private sector need to act now to turn the world’s 500 million small farms into profitable businesses, said Kanayo F. Nwanze, President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).

Prior to leaving for Dar es Salaam to attend the regional World Economic Forum (WEF) on Africa, hosted by the United Republic of Tanzania, Nwanze said, “What we need to be rethinking is how to turn political will into profits for Africa’s agriculture sector, 95 per cent of which is smallholder farming.”

He added that this could be accomplished if African governments step up their investment in agriculture and build partnerships with the private sector in an open and accountable way. “Working to double the income of a subsistence farmer is simply poverty management. But helping that farmer to launch an agribusiness; that is poverty eradication,” emphasized Nwanze.

The theme of this year’s WEF meeting on Africa is “Rethinking Africa's Growth Strategy”. Nwanze is slated to speak at key Forum sessions.

“African governments must create the right policy environment to allow agribusinesses and agro-industries to develop and flourish, which can provide much-needed employment for Africa’s youths,” he said. “At the same time, investments by the international community and developing country governments need to be smart to focus on the research and development of new technologies to enhance productivity and intensify production.”

Investments and policies need to pave the way for private sector involvement by providing smallholder farmers sufficient access to assets such as land and water, and improving infrastructure, such as roads, power and storage.

During the Forum, Nwanze will outline the potential and promise of rural agriculture and call for governments of African countries and the private sector to find synergies among their competing priorities.

“We must continue to ask tough questions about how African countries, and particularly their leadership, are managing their own houses and applaud those who are setting examples,” said Nwanze, adding that “lessons must be learned from past mistakes that have led to misery for poor people in the rural areas of the continent.”

It will be the first time the WEF has held its meeting in East Africa, where according to UN agencies, a major food crisis is building in southern Sudan.

“With some 80 million small farms in sub-Saharan Africa producing 80 per cent of the agricultural outputs, smallholder farmers can unlock the continent’s potential to feed itself,” he continued.

“Agriculture, irrespective of the size of the farm, is a business. And every entrepreneur, whether it is a smallholder farmer or a large commercial farmer, needs or wants to make money. We have the responsibility to transform smallholder agriculture into smallholder businesses," Nwanze said.

At WEF, Nwanze will meet private sector leaders and explore wealth creation for smallholder farmers. “I will be working to empower them to increase incomes from one dollar a day to five dollars a day,” he stated. Partnerships with the private sector are a linchpin in the new vision of IFAD, and under Nwanze’s leadership the Fund is looking to mobilise resources through the private sector for agro-processing, marketing and business development to transform rural areas into thriving economies. 

Press release No.: IFAD/30/2010

The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) works with poor rural people to enable them to grow and sell more food, increase their incomes and determine the direction of their own lives. Since 1978, IFAD has invested over US$11 billion in grants and low-interest loans to developing countries, empowering some 350 million people to break out of poverty. IFAD is an international financial institution and a specialized UN agency based in Rome – the UN’s food and agricultural hub. It is a unique partnership of 165 members from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), other developing countries and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).