By Enyichukwu Enemanna
The African Development Bank on Tuesday approved the sum of $11.7 million budgetary allocation to the African Fertilizer Financing Mechanism (AFFM) to carry out its 2023 operations.
This makes it the total of $16.4 million made available to the Facility to support its 2023 budget.
The sum of $4.7 million was carried over from the previous year.
In a statement on Tuesday, the AfDB says its Board of Directors also validated AFFM’s 2023 programme of activities: strengthening the fertilizer sector through access to finance, supporting the development of sustainable policy reforms to improve fertilizer production, trade and use, and facilitating access to inputs and technical assistance for smallholder farmers.
According to the statement, AFFM plans to continue implementing three commercial credit guarantee projects amounting to $8.3 million.
“The recipient countries are Zimbabwe ($4.3 million), Côte d’Ivoire ($2 million), and Ghana ($2 million). For 2023, it plans to implement trade credit guarantee schemes totaling $9.7 million in Tanzania, Uganda, Mozambique and Kenya.
“Three more new projects could be launched in Senegal, Zambia and Ghana if the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) follows through on its $15 million commitment to the AFFM.
“The 2023 projects will be implemented to support the second pillar of the Bank’s African Emergency Food Production Facility, which was launched to avert a looming food crisis in Africa following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“In addition, MAFDE will actively work with African countries and other key stakeholders to develop the national food and agriculture pacts that the continent’s leaders presented at the Feed Africa Summit in Dakar in January 2023.”
AfDB says AFFM will facilitate smallholder farmers’ access to inputs and extension services through credit guarantee projects and capacity building for farmers and input distributors, with the objective to ensure proper use of fertilizers, increase agricultural productivity and improve soil conditions.
