Africa urges water management co-op

African countries have adopted a document calling for a consistent approach aimed at alleviating the alarming food crisis in the continent.

Nearly 140 delegates from 37 African countries, who met June 16-18 in Nairobi ahead of the high level meeting of UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Regional Conference for Africa, resolved that there is need to scale up agricultural water management and intra-Africa trade.

They also resolved to address challenges for sustainable land management for food security in Africa, urbanization, food security and agrarian reform and rural development as well as knowledge exchange and capacity building.

According to a document released after the meeting, the representatives of the African countries observed that scaling up agricultural water management and creating an integrated irrigation system was a priority for the implementation of the first pillar of Comprehensive Africa Agricultural Development Program (CAADP).

"The expected 60 percent area expansion for agricultural water management by 2015 as was projected by CAADP will not be attained if the current one percent annual growth rate was maintained. This situation was inter alia ascribed to lack of strategic vision and decreasing investment in the sub sector," the document said.

The delegates reminded the African ministers of agriculture of new investment opportunities in agricultural water harvesting as noted in the recent World Development Report and in the current soaring food prices.

They underscored the need for productivity improvement of potential of rain-fed agriculture and the need for reliable water and inputs such as improved seeds, fertilizer and other good agricultural practices in order for Africa to attain the Millennium Development Goals of food security and poverty reduction.

The document to be adopted by African countries recommends priority investment options such as increasing productivity and profitability of existing irrigation schemes through rehabilitation, modernization and institutional reforms, expanding or developing new micro small, medium and large scale agricultural water management systems.

They also agreed to develop infrastructure networks that facilitate market access for agricultural products and investing in research on agricultural water management to improve water productivity and adapting to climate change and mitigate its impacts.

The meeting further recommended that member countries and their development partners like FAO adopt a holistic approach to water management to promote joint development of shared river and lake basins as a way of regional integration.

The experts agreed that a common African market that transcends national and sub-regional borders would offer an appropriate economic space to foster private investments at the level of regional economies.

"This implies that, for the selected strategic commodities, there is need to move market integration beyond the current pace of reform to create a Free Trade Area at the continental level," they said.

"These strategic commodities would be those that carry an important weight in the African food basket, hold an important weight in the trade balance of the region and have considerable unexploited production potential in Africa."

The experts observed that intra African trade was still faced with a number of challenges limiting expansion among them low agricultural production and productivity, insufficient and inappropriate infrastructures, unfair trade practices from developed nations and insufficient agricultural financing.