Seminar Activities: Day 1| Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 6
We were recently contracted by the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation to coordinate a study visit on milk and milk processing, for stakeholders in the Eastern and Southern Africa region. The purpose and other details on the study visit are available in a concept note developed by CTA and presented below. Highlights were prepared on daily activities of the study visit (..) and a detailed report covering the entire seminar will be ready in the next few days.
STUDY VISIT ON MILK and milk PROCESSING IN EastERN AND SOUTHERN AFRICA
KENYA, 16 -25 FEBRUARY 2009
Concept Note (version 030908)
introduction
1. The development of the agrifood sectors is both a major lever for stimulating primary production and an efficient means for combating poverty through the jobs it creates. It is also a basic element for the promotion of food security through an increase in the availability and diversity of food and nutrition.
2. Agri-foodstuffs constitute one of the most important sectors of activities in African countries. Unfortunately, this sector is subject to numerous constraints at the processing level that disadvantage the competitiveness of small and medium-sized enterprises. As a result, it constitutes on average only 10% of the agricultural production surplus, whereas this figure is 50% or more in industrialised countries.
3. The contribution of the local food processing industry in feeding the population in African countries is still far below par. It concerns essentially consumers in urban areas. The rise in internal demand and the potential it represents for small agrifood businesses is not taken sufficiently into account.
4. The trade associations of the various agrifood sub-sectors, which can serve as representative negotiating partners for the public authorities are not very organised or efficient when it comes to providing services to the member SMEs. This state of affairs limits the organisational, technological and financial support that these SMEs can get.
5. Competitiveness and compliance with international regulations and standards on food safety are major challenges that small and medium-sized agrifood enterprises (SMEs) are facing as they endeavour to get into position on the national, regional and international markets.
6. To take up all these challenges, the companies concerned must implement appropriate strategies to mobilise and use information and communication.
7. The seminar organised by the CTA on the role of information and communication in the development of small and medium-sized agrifood enterprises in Africa (Cotonou, Benin, 2006) recommended charting and implementing coherent information and communication strategies to tackle more efficiently the main problems currently encountered: the poor quality of basic materials, difficulties in accessing packaging, insufficient mastery of technologies, difficulties accessing equipment, scarce adoption of innovations, knowledge, and still insufficient mastery of regulations.
8. One of the elements of this strategy consists of organising experience exchange visits by and between various entrepreneurs in the agrifood sector, so that they can enrich their knowledge of different opportunities through visits of the production departments.
9. The development possibilities of agrifood companies are contingent upon their capacity to innovate in terms of production (new products), marketing (presentation of the product, distribution channels, etc.), and organisation (grouping for the supply or marketing). What is innovative for one company, may not necessarily be for another. Innovation often stems from an idea taken from elsewhere.
10. The observation of different methods leads to a germination of ideas for change in an entrepreneur to develop or improve his activity. African entrepreneurs, however, do not often get an opportunity to go and see what is being done elsewhere, and especially outside their own country.
11. Visits therefore provide an opportunity for such operators to exchange information and ideas with their counterparts on their practices and to adapt new methods in their own contexts.
12. These visits have a double impact: visitors become acquainted with new technologies or new forms of organisation by observing and questioning their colleagues, but in addition to the exchanges and discussions, the latter are also prodded to reconsider their own ways of doing things.
13. It is in this context that the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation ACP-EU (CTA) is organising a study visit on milk and milk products processing to be held in Kenya from 16 to 25 February 2009.
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