The overall objective of the Route is to improve understanding of innovative mechanisms and tools for a sustainable inclusion of small-scale producers in agricultural value chains.
The specific objectives are as follows:
- Identify and analyze innovative mechanisms with which to accompany and structure FOs and promoting sustainable inclusion of rural youths and women;
- Analyze strategies in order to promote the contractualization between small-scale producers and market operators (notably processors);
- Identify and analyze the institutional arrangements and tools to encourage and promote cooperation of actors throughout the value chain;
- Analyze how financial institutions can play an active role in the organization of a value chain.
This Route was an opportunity for participants to analyze the various key links in agricultural value chains (production, processing and marketing) and identify at each of these stages the difficulties and solutions that were provided thanks to innovative mechanisms and institutional arrangements.
The Learning Route were therefore evolved around three projects of national scope, recognized in Senegal and the WCA region as having achieved remarkable results when it comes to market access for small-scale producers (including rural youths and women).
During the Route, the participants were able to learn about the emblematic successful experiences with this value chain approach linked to projects, and the knowledge of Local Champions and other key stakeholders (including the private sector) in different regions of the country.
Host cases
This agricultural value chain support project (PAFA IFAD co-funded project) has been seen as a model project in Senegal. It was implemented between 2010 and 2015 in the regions of Kaolack, Diourbel, Fatick and Kaffrine and is now being scaled up. Overall, the project reached nearly 40,000 vulnerable rural households directly in its first phase. In five years, they have moved from a situation in which 70% of households experienced a hunger gap lasting on average 3.5 months to one in which 82% of households supported by the Project are now protected from the effects of the lean period. One of the noteworthy reasons for this change is that yields have more than doubled for all the crops promoted by the project.
The Naatal Mbay project is being implemented as part of the “Feed the Future” initiative. It began in March 2015 and follows on from the Economic Growth Project (USAID/PCE) that had begun in 2009. For six years, the PCE developed a partnership with men and women producers growing rice, corn and millet in the northern, central and southern areas of the country to increase their productivity and competitiveness, as well as with private operators so that they could seize the opportunities offered by the cereal sector. The PCE is a project that marked Senegal and inspired the government in new actions. This program contributed heavily to encouraging stakeholders to enter contractual relations for the various transactions in the cereal sector.
The originality and success of ASPRODEB’s experience is due to the adoption of a downstream value chain approach around bakery products, which consists of taking “a comprehensive look at the entire commodity chain, from producers (millet, corn, sorghum) to final consumers.” In other words, unlike past experiences that focused above all on bakers, the approach here encompassed all value chain stakeholders so that they could all meet quality and volume requirements. In addition to this, a truly demand-based strategy was enacted so as to foster shifts in consumption habits over to local cereals.
