What We Do and Why

In order to have the broadest and most long-lasting regional impact, we concentrate on building the capacity of professional and inter-professional national and regional organizations whose members include agricultural producers, agro-input suppliers, agro-processors, traders, and other value chain actors.  We help those organizations get established and become operational, connect to one another for expanded business relationships and markets, build master trainers’ skills they in turn impart to peers in “cascade training,” work with the organizations on advocating for improved public policies, offer access to finance, assure gender equity, foster public-private partnerships for long-term investment, and expand on what the USAID bilateral missions are doing.  
 

Our main objective is to increase the value and volume of intra-regional agricultural trade in West Africa; our specific objectives are to:

•    Reduce the incidence of physical and policy-related barriers to moving                       agricultural and related commodities regionally in West Africa, with a special               focus on facilitating the trade in staple foods from surplus to deficit areas;  
• Offer opportunities for linkages among value chain stakeholders; 
• Ensure more effective advocacy for regional and national policies in support of a         conducive environment for increased regional agricultural trade;
• Improve trade transactions and regional market access, in particular through the        improvement of regional market information systems.
• Enhance the capacity of private poultry and animal health sectors to reduce the         risk of avian influenza (AI) outbreaks and transmission, recover after such                 outbreaks, and advocate for the lifting of bans on poultry trade when such               threats no longer exist.