Earth-observation services for monitoring Africa’s agricultural output

The challenge of AfriCultuReS is to improve food security in sub-Saharan Africa, where 35% of the population over 15 years of age suffered severe food shortages in 2016 (FAO - November 2017).

AfriCultuReS, coordinated by GMV, brings together seventeen prestigious African and European reference entities from various fields of specialization such as climatology, meteorology, crop monitoring and modelling, information technology, social sciences and earth observation. AfriCultuReS aims to design, implement and operationally validate an integrated monitoring, scenario analysis and early warning system as a tool for decision making in the field of food production assurance in Africa.

The project is expected to provide a wide range of climate, economic, biophysical and food production information for various regions of Africa. To this end, it will apply geospatial science for sustainable agricultural development, natural resource management, biodiversity conservation and poverty reduction in Africa.

Supported by a number of multilateral agencies GEO - Group of Earth Observations, African Development Bank (AfDB) and the African Union, AfriCultuReS, all major actors of AfriGEOSS, GEOGLAM, GMES & Africa and other major initiatives, as well as actors representing the diversity of African agricultural systems, will be involved in an effort to improve the services provided by existing systems, with the innovative fusion of data from African agricultural systems.

Within the framework of the project, the African partners and collaborative networks will be essential to carry out the work of designing, training and promoting the use of project tools. In particular, they will use techniques and tools of social innovation to increase the number of participants and boost the flow of information in a simple and comfortable way. The ultimate goal will be to produce a web-based system that helps decision makers in the area of food production in Africa.

In addition to the overall scientific, technical and administrative coordination of the project, GMV is also responsible for the technical aspects of the communication, knowledge transfer and exploitation plan. GMV is also a leader in the task of analysing user requirements and assessing food safety risks. At the same time, GMV will manage the task focused sustainability and consequent exploitation of results beyond the financial support of the H2020 program.

For the inauguration of the project, all the participants met in Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) on 23 and 24 November for fruitful start-up days attended by the Ethiopian Minister of Irrigation and Electricity, Dr. Seleshi Bekele. The Minister stressed the importance of cooperating with the EU to achieve sustainable development objectives, stressing that “with projects such as AfriCultuReS, this cooperation is entering a new phase”.

According to Dr. Tidiane Ouattara,Head of the African Union GMES & Africa Programme Unit, who also delivered a speech at the project’s kickoff meeting. “This project can make a difference by involving stakeholders and end-users of Earth Observation products from the outset”.

In turn, Dr. Franz Immler, Head of Climate Action at the European Commission, exceptionally displaced outside Europe for the occasion, highlighted “the role of AfriCultuReS in the context of the Europe-Africa dialogue” recently consolidated at the 5th African Union - EU Summit recently held in Abidjan, (Côte d’Ivoire, 29-30 November 2017).

AfriCultuReS is seen by the EU as one of the cornerstones of the European Commission’s strategy to intensify cooperation with its African partners, contributing to the development of Europena Union-African Union policy, while promoting and supporting GEO activities and its flagship programmes (e.g. GEOGLAM), regional initiatives, EuroGEOSS and AfriGEOSS.

The event provided an opportunity to establish the framework for the coming years of activities and exchange with invited projects, also funded by the EU, initiatives and professional organisations, concrete opportunities for collaboration in the near future.