Food crisis and insecurity emerge at EAC donors meet

Arusha. Agriculture and food insecurity emerged yesterday at a forum convened for the East African Community (EAC) and its donors.

The development partners in attendance pledged continued support that would tap the economic potential of the bloc.

These are in areas of trade facilitation, agriculture and food security as well as the challenges posed by climate change.

However,there was a special emphasis on the security challenges in some parts of the region and which need to be urgently tackled.

Although the officials could not mention where, the newly admitted partner state DR Congo is yet to sort out insecurity on its eastern rim.

South Sudan, on the other hand, has not seen everlasting peace since the break out of the civil war in December 2013.

EAC secretary general Peter Mathuki said the development partners were keen to extend support for full integration of DR Congo.

He could not say how much has been pledged at yesterday’s 3rd High Level EAC Development Partners’ Group (DPG) forum.

“We have presented the list of priority projects in terms of value. But it will be upon them to study and respond”, he told The Citizen.

The development partners were concerned by the impact of climate change in the region that has led to drought and food insecurity.

Parts of the EAC bloc such as South Sudan and the northern half of Kenya are facing severe food crises due to insufficient rains.

“They (dev partners) want the private sector to take a leading role in implementation of the regional integration projects.” Dr Mathuki said.

Jean Baptiste Havugimana, the EAC director of productive sectors said DRC was likely to attract funding within the EAC framework after its recent admission in the bloc.

The projects that will come up in the vast country, according to him, include capacity building for DRC “which is very much needed.”

The one day forum discussed how to strengthen the existing projects under implementation and called for timely implementation. The seven EAC partner states were also urged to embrace digitalization to improve efficiency in the implementation of the regional projects.

“This was not a forum for pledging but manifested interest in furthering negotiations with our traditional development partners,” he said.

The EAC DPG is composed of bilateral and multilateral development partners which are engaged in development cooperation with the bloc.

Members of the group at yesterday’s forum were China, Japan, United States, South Korea, Switzerland, Serbia, Norway, Germany and Ireland.

Others were the European Union (EU),the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the Japan International Cooperation Agency (Jica), USAid, GIZ and a host of other multilateral agencies