Digital innovation strategy for agrifood systems in Africa

Download or read book Digital innovation strategy for agrifood systems in Africa written by Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and published by Food & Agriculture Org.. This book was released on 2022-02-11 with total page 26 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Achieving Zero Hunger, defeating poverty and accelerating sustainable inclusive growth are key objectives pursued by the African continent, particularly in the framework of the UN Agenda 2030 and the African Union Agenda 2063. However, the region has been facing persistent challenges resulting in high levels of food and nutrition insecurity, rampant poverty, environmental threats, underperformance of the agrifood sector, unemployment and under-employment for young (male and female) people, especially in rural areas. Addressing the challenges and seizing the available opportunities require news skills, capabilities and product development, which notably involves strongly anchoring digital technologies in all business processes. Falling costs of digital technologies and their popularisation are driving innovations to develop solutions to improve the productivity, incomes and resilience of farmers and food systems. This includes the building of more adaptive and agile value chains through use of data, leveraging the power of satellite observation and geodata to address pest and disease threats; the development of novel solutions for supporting farmers’ social protection; and the enhancement of traceability systems applied to food products from farm to fork. The COVID-19 impacts have demonstrated even more the need to mainstream digital solutions in agrifood business, policy and development programme implementation processes