OVERVIEW OF FAO SUPPORT TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURAL STATISTICS SYSTEMS IN AFRICA By

1. FAO ASSISTANCE IN STATISTICS FOR AFRICA OVERVIEW OF FAO SUPPORT TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURAL STATISTICS SYSTEMS IN AFRICA By Naman Keita Senior Statistician FAO Regional Office for Africa Accra, Ghana Naman.Keita@fao.org UNECA-PARIS21-AfDB Forum on African Statistical DEVelopment (FASDEV) Addis Ababa (Ethiopia): 12 – 13 May 2004

2. Content of the presentation • INTRODUCTION • FAO’s Mission • FAO’s Statistics Division and decentralised structures in Africa • Issues of Food and Agricultural Statistics Systems in African Countries • FAO’s ASSISTANCE TO AFRICAN COUNTRIES IN STATISTICS • Past experience and new strategy for assistance • Overview of FAO activities and programmes • New programmes and activities in Agricultural Statistics in Africa • FUNDING • SOME ISSUES AND CHALLENGES

3. I.Introduction FAO ’s mission • Target adopted at the World Food Summit (1996): “To reduce by half the number of chronically undernourished people on the Earth by the year 2015 (from 800 to 400 millions)” • The FAO Constitution states that “the Organisation shall collect, analyse, interpret and disseminate information relating to nutrition, food and agriculture”. FAO Statistics Division : http://www.fao.org/es/ESS/index_en.asp • 3 services at HQ/Rome (24 staff in place) : Socio-Economic Statistics and Analysis Service; Surveys and Statistical Development Service; Basic Food and Agriculture Statistics Service • 2 Out-posted Officers in Accra (1 Senior Statistician at FAO Regional Office for Africa) and Harare (1 Statistician at FAO Sub-regional Office for Southern and Eastern Africa) Issues of Food and Agricultural Statistics in African Countries • Importance of agriculture and rural sector in African economies and societies (at least two third of Africa's poor people live in rural areas) • Growing demand for data: MDG, PRSP, Food Security, NEPAD/CAADP, Decentralisation, Environment • Weak capacity of agricultural statistics systems in Africa despite past assistance: widening gap between data requirement and availability

4. II. FAO assistance in Statistics in Africa Past experience and new strategy for assistance • Ad-hoc assistance projects for data collection resulted in large amount of data available in some areas but not always analysed and used • Lack of clearly defined institutional frame work for agricultural statistics and lack of national commitment and ownership • Insufficient analysis and use of existing data, • Vicious circle of lack of resources, low quality of data (and sometimes not policy-relevant) and weak agricultural statistics systems.

5. II. FAO assistance in Statistics in Africa New Strategy for assistance • New strategy derived from analysis of FAO and other Institutions experience in agricultural statistics and recommendations from international for a (see www.Paris21.org for Recommendations of Seminar of September 2002 in Paris). The strategy put the emphasis on: • promoting the development of policy-driven and integrated agricultural statistics systems in a stable and sustainable institutional framework which is owned and supported by national governments with assistance from partners; • adding value to existing data through better information management systems, analysis and wide dissemination and use of data and • focusing more directly on capacity building in countries (with particular emphasis on the production, analysis and use of data in support of policy) through methodological publications, technical workshops, training sessions and exchange of experiences among countries as well as field projects.

6. II. FAO assistance in Statistics in Africa Overview of the fields of assistance by FAO 1/ Capacity building through training and exchanges of experiences • Statutory commissions • African Commission on Agricultural Statistics (AFCAS): Biennial meetings: Guinea 1999, South Africa 2001, Cameroon October 2003. • Experts consultations: root crop statistics, livestock statistics, horticulture and urban agriculture • Seminars, Technical Workshops and Training Sessions (organized jointly with other Institutions: WB, AFRISTAT, PARIS21) 2/ Technical assistance through field projects • Subject matters : • Strengthening statistical capacities • Integrated agricultural statistics systems • Preparation / implementation of agricultural censuses (Algeria, Cote d’Ivoire, Niger, Tanzania, etc..) 3/ Data dissemination on the Internet : FAOSTAT : http://apps.fao.org/default.htm

7. II. FAO assistance in Statistics in Africa New programme activities • 18th AFCAS: Survey and assessment of countries capacity and practices in agricultural statistics to be conducted every 2 years for advocacy, information sharing and monitoring progress in capacity building. • Revision of FAO’s global Database, FAOSTAT2 and development of Country module: CountryStat • Trade matrix for Food and Agriculture products (tables maps) • Training in Data analysis [Supply Utilisation Accounts, National Demonstration Centre on deriving Food Security Indicators from Household Surveys] • New FAO body: Statistical Advisory Committee: recent meeting 28-29 April 2004 in Rome. • International Initiative for Strengthening Food and Agricultural Statistics in Africa: 2 interim projects (WB/TFSCB and French Cooperation): High Level Seminar on Agricultural Statistics and Regional Integration for ECOWAS countries and discussion of a Charter on good practices: September/October 2004

8. III. Sources of funding • The sources of funding for FAO field projects: http://www.fao.org/tc/ • FAO ‘s own funds : Technical Cooperation Programme (TCP) • Trust funds: Government Cooperation Programme (GCP), Unilateral Trust Funds (UTF) • UNDP funds

9. IV. Issues and challenges • How to ensure sustainability of agricultural statistics systems at country level (resources…)? • Integration of agricultural statistics systems within national statistics systems: How to best articulate agricultural statistics components within national strategic statistical plans and set-up effective institutional and legal framework? • How to increase the relevance of agricultural statistics to priority policy agenda? • Technical and methodological issues specific to agricultural statistics in Africa • How to promote partnership, coordination, complementarity and synergy at all levels: between stakeholders at country level, between countries, between international agencies (UN Statistical Commission, PARIS21, AFCAS, SAC, IWG-AGRI etc..)