A comprehensive "Africa Manifesto and Plan of Action on Forgotten Foods" outlines the critical need to reintegrate traditional, underutilised crops into Africa's food systems to combat increasing food insecurity. This insecurity is driven by climate change, conflict, rapid population growth, and an over-reliance on a few staple crops, moving away from diverse traditional food systems.
The manifesto highlights that forgotten foods possess enormous nutritional, medicinal, and economic value. Promoting these crops could significantly contribute to poverty reduction and improve food security across the continent. However, despite their potential, these foods have suffered from neglect in research, extension services, commercialization, and conservation efforts.
The Challenge of Neglect
This long-term neglect has led to a decline in the consumption of traditional food resources and an erosion of associated knowledge. To harness the potential of forgotten foods, the manifesto calls for collective actions at global, regional, and national levels. These include raising awareness, creating an enabling environment for research and development, empowering farmers, and encouraging private sector involvement in processing and marketing.
Pillars of the Manifesto and Action Plan
The manifesto is structured around five core pillars with associated actions:
- Establish a dedicated and functional research and innovation system: This involves continent-wide research systems, embracing agricultural innovation systems with multi-stakeholder engagement, and focusing on identification, characterization, breeding, and food system research for forgotten foods.
- Incrementally build appropriate innovation capacity: This includes increasing awareness of forgotten foods, respecting farmers' rights, integrating knowledge into education, developing infrastructure, and advocating for policy changes.
- Establish partnerships and strategic alliances: Key to this is fostering the engagement of youth and women for rapid integration into national food systems and policy development.
- Facilitate private sector engagement: Creating structured engagement for investment in production, processing, and marketing of forgotten foods, including incentives and market access support.
- Create a regional pool of financial resources: Developing innovative funding mechanisms and facilitating joint investments to support research and development efforts.
The document stresses that a prompt re-orientation and education of the public, policymakers, and stakeholders is necessary to reposition the continent for food security. Support from donor agencies and institutions to bring forgotten foods into mainstream agriculture is seen as crucial to realizing their hidden benefits.
This manifesto serves as a vital call to action, emphasizing that investing in resilient, locally adapted crops is essential for a sustainable and food-secure future for Africa.