SVCDC - KenyaIDPA - UgandaCURAD - UgandaCAF - MaliAgBIT - Zambia CCLEARr - Ghana

Ralph von KaufmannUniBRAIN Facility Coordinator

Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa

Opportunities for strengthening

UniBRAIN through GABI

NIABI 2112 Roundtable on Strengthening GABI, 2012 

 1130-1300 hrs February 7, 2012, New Delhi, India

Opportunities for strengthening UniBRAIN through GABI

Rationale: UniBRAIN is an emerging network

UniBRAIN Strengths: could GABI benefit from them?

UniBRAIN Weaknesses: could GABI strengthen them?

UniBRAIN Opportunities: could GABI help realise them?

UniBRAIN Threats: could GABI help mitigate them?

Take home messages

CONTENT

Opportunities for strengthening UniBRAIN through GABI

Strength from strong partnership:

UniBRAIN

FARA

ANAFE

PanACC

ABI-ICRISAT

Danida

SROs

Funding agencyRoyal

Danish Ministry of

Affairs

Overall coordinationForum for Agricultural Research in

Africa Facilitating university

participationAfrican Network for Agriculture,

Agroforestry and Natural Resources

Education

Facilitating private sector

participationPanAfrican

Agribusiness and Agroindustry Consortium

Agribusiness Incubator Programme of the International Crops Research Institute for the

Semi Arid Tropics

Facilitating agricultural research participation

Sub Regional Organisations

Opportunities for strengthening UniBRAIN through GABI

AN EMERGING AFRICAN AGRIBUSINES INCUBATOR NETWORKUniBRAIN agribusiness incubators

The Consortium for enhancing University Responsiveness to Agribusiness Development (UniBRAIN-CURAD) focusing on plantation cash crops Specific value chain: Coffee

The Incubation and Diversification of Banana Products for Agribusiness (UniBRAIN-ABP or Afri Banana) focusing on staple food and cash crops Specific value chain: Banana

The Sorghum Value Chain Development Consortium (UniBRAIN-SVCDC) focusing on smallholder dry land food grains Specific value chain: Sorghum

The Creating Competitive Livestock-bias Entrepreneurs in Agribusiness (UniBRAIN-CCLEAr) focusing on Smallholder livestock Specific value chain: Livestock

The Innovative Centre for Agro-forestry (UniBRAIN-CAF) focusing on agro-forestry products Specific value chains: non-timber forestry products, cereals and fruits

The Agri-Business Incubation Trust (UniBRAIN-AgBIT) focusing on tropical fruit Specific value chain: Mango

UniBRAIN CAF

UniBRAIN CCLEAr

UniBRAIN AgBIT

Uni

BRAIN

SVCDCUni

BRAIN

ABP

Uni

BRAIN

CURAD

Strength from geographic spread of action on continental value chains

Opportunities for strengthening UniBRAIN through GABI

UniBRAIN is not exclusively Danida funded Collaboration developing with infoDev and others could expand the network

Opportunities for strengthening UniBRAIN through GABI

Strength from geographic spread of action on continental value chains

UniBRAIN is not exclusively Danida funded

Collaboration developing with infoDev and others

Opportunities for strengthening UniBRAIN through GABI

African agriculture is on the move

Through FARA UniBRAIN linked to African Union Commission

Investors are interested in Africa (including sovereign wealth)

Agribusiness incubators working on value chains with high potential for scaling up

Partners mandates

FARA, ANAFE & PanAAC have continental mandates

SROs have subregional mandates

All linked to national and local farmers and institutions

UniBRAIN strengths: could GABI benefit from them

1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010

0

50

100

150

200

250

Figure 1. The usually quoted dataChanges in per capita net agricultural

production (1961-2007)

Asia

South America

World

Africa

Per

cap

ita

foo

d p

rod

uct

ion

(19

61=1

00)

1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010

0

100

200

300

400

500

Figure 2. less quoted data Changes in net agricultural production (1961-

2007)

Asia

South America

Africa

World

North America

Europe

Fo

od

pro

du

ctio

n (

1961

=100

)

Opportunities for strengthening UniBRAIN through GABI

African agriculture is on the move

Through FARA UniBRAIN linked to African Union Commission

Investors are interested in Africa (including sovereign wealth)

Agribusiness incubators working on value chains with high potential for scaling up

Partners mandates

FARA, ANAFE & PanAAC have continental mandates

SROs have subregional mandates

All linked to national and local farmers and institutions

UniBRAIN strengths: could GABI benefit from them

Opportunities for strengthening UniBRAIN through GABI

Inexperience because the incubators are just being

established

Systems not yet developed e.g., for selecting incubatees

Weak infrastructure

Small community of agribusiness incubators

Uncritical audience

UniBRAIN Weaknesses: could GABI strengthen them

Opportunities for strengthening UniBRAIN through GABI

Widens sources of ideas

Expands pool of human and institutional experience and expertise

Opens trading opportunities both ways

Strengthens voice of emerging and developing economies in agribusiness (and general business) negotiations with WTO and other global conventions

UniBRAIN Opportunities: could GABI help UniBRAIN realise them

Opportunities for strengthening UniBRAIN through GABI

Weak competitive position in globalising markets

Limited capacity in developing legal instruments such

as intellectual property rights, patenting, commercial

confidentiality

Limited capacity for due diligence globally

Competition for specialised talent

UniBRAIN Threats: could GABI help UniBRAIN mitigate them?

Opportunities for strengthening UniBRAIN through GABI

NIABI and UniBRAIN could catalyse formation of GABI

For UniBRAIN members this would:

‘S’ Enable agribusinesses in Africa to exploit their strengths

‘W’ Widen pools of expertise and innovations available to Africa and improve cross fertilisation

‘O’ Strengthen African agribusiness competitiveness

‘T’ Widen opportunities for African agriculture in global markets and strengthen the negotiating position of agribusiness in emerging and developing markets

These are all equally applicable to agribusinesses in other GABI members e.g., NIABI, Marditec

Take home messages

For more information visit:

www.fara-africa.org/our projects/unibrain

THANK YOU

UniBRAIN a new gateway into African agribusiness

ORGANISATION: The UniBRAIN Facility

FARA Secretariate UniBRAIN Facility

1. Executive Director 2. Deputy Executive

Director 3. Director Finance 4. Director Capacity

Strengthening (NSF4 Budget Holder)

UniBRAIN Partnership Committee

UniBRAIN Steering

Committee

UniBRAIN Executive

Committee

UniBRAIN Facility

Coordinator*)

UniBRAIN Accountant*)

(Incubator Support)

UniBRAIN Community Manager*)

UniBRAIN Programme

Officer*)

PanAAC ABI-ICRISAT

ANAFE SROs UniBRAIN Partners

Formal/contractual responsibilities Networking/ technical relations Work programming

UniBRAIN Incubators

CURAD IDBPA SVCDC CCLEAr CAF AgBIT

Board Board Board Board Board Board

Legend

*) Line responsibilities and conditions of service to be handled within FARA’s human resource and administrative framework