COMESA’S BID TO ADDRESS HIGH FOOD INFLATION

MBABANE - The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) is equally aware of the challenges that farmers are facing in light of climate change.
This has already been evidenced by the 2015/2016, 2023/2024 southern Africa El Niño drought, as well as the 2021/22 La Niña drought in east Africa, which led to poor harvests and contributed to the high prices of food in these regions. Therefore, COMESA is making efforts to support regional and national adaptation and mitigation responses to climate change challenges faced by COMESA Member States.

Trade

COMESA is a regional economic community in Africa with 21 Member States stretching from Tunisia to Eswatini. COMESA was formed in December 1994, replacing a preferential trade area that had existed since 1981.Last week, COMESA held the fourth diplomatic conference on competition and trade to deliberate food security issues as the region is currently experiencing effects of climate change and high food inflation.The conference was held at the Avani Victoria Falls Hotel, Livingstone, Zambia.COMESA Secretary General (SG) Chileshe Kapwepwe said the theme of the conference theme: ‘Enforcing Competition Law to Address Food Inflation, Food Security and Eradicate Poverty,’  was timely given the circumstances that several Member States of the common market were facing due to climate change leading to poor harvests and shortages of food.

Kapwepwe noted that the agriculture sector was one of the key sectors for most Member States, as it contributes more than 32 per cent to the gross domestic product (GDP) of COMESA, provides a livelihood to about 80 per cent of the region’s labour force, accounts for about 65 per cent of foreign exchange earnings and contributes more than 50 per cent of raw materials to the industrial sector. She said in this regard, COMESA, through its agriculture programmes, has been providing support towards increased agricultural productivity and agro-processing for improved food security and nutrition and agro-product competitiveness in the COMESA region.

Production

She said one of the focus areas has been advancing the implementation of the Comprehensive African Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) /Malabo commitments to boost agricultural productivity and production in the region for improved livelihoods and food security and facilitation of sectoral reviews of the implementation of agriculture, environment and natural resource strategic plans and programmes to inform and provide strategic guidance. Kapwepwe said this programme also contributes to strengthening agri-food data systems in the region for improved agricultural market access and trade in select commodities in the region and for developing COMESA regional strategic frameworks to enhance post-harvest management, agri-food market access and trade and food and nutrition security in the region.

Development

The SG added that the COMESA Climate Change programme implemented the Intra-African, Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP) Global Climate Change Alliance Plus (GCCA+) Programme, which aims to increase the resilience of the COMESA region to climate change and achieve the United Nations’s Sustainable Development Goal on climate change and its impacts to reduce poverty and promote sustainable development.She said one of the key activities implemented by the programme was the climate-smart agriculture projects, including landscape- and ecosystem-based solutions scaled up from which some Member States benefitted.

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