AfDB Strengthens Fight Against Food Insecurity In Burkina Faso

(AFRICAN EXAMINER) – African Development Bank (AfDB) through one of its flagship initiatives is currently helping women and children in Burkina Faso to overcome food insecurity.

Despite its tremendous agricultural potential, Burkina Faso has long grappled with the thorny problem of food and nutrition security. Regrettably, in a country, where 82 percent of the population is employed in the agricultural sector, low productivity has a knock-on effect on livelihoods.

Poor water usage, environmental degradation, vulnerability to climate change and lack of access to finance and to nutrition information are just some of the causes of food insecurity, which is widespread in the Sahel region.

Notably, an African Development Fund (ADF) initiative, a Multinational Programme to Build Resilience to Food and Nutrition Insecurity in the Sahel, has been successful in tackling food insecurity and building up the overall resilience of vulnerable populations of farmers, fishers and pastoralists in the country.

Under the initiative, the ADF, the African Development Bank Group’s concessional window that lends to low-income countries, has extended $32 million, half of it in the form of grants to the government of Burkina Faso.

The programme focuses on empowering women and on infant wellbeing. It is developing rural infrastructure to support sustainable hydro-agriculture, forestry, pastoralism, fisheries and beekeeping.

In addition, it promotes the economy of post-harvest sectors and access to markets. It also dwells equally on improving the nutritional quality of food and making it more widely available to vulnerable populations.

Since the programme’s inception in 2015, it has provided much-needed support to the most vulnerable populations in 92 communes in the Centre, Centre-South, Centre-West, Central Plateau, Boucle du Mouhoun and Sahel administrative regions of Burkina Faso.

Moreover, some livestock farmers have seen their revenue increase by up to 30 percent. Access to public infrastructure has improved, resulting in strengthened value chains and healthier living.