The Legislation and Policy Environment For Ecological Organic - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

The Legislation and Policy Environment For Ecological Organic Agriculture in Eastern Africa

By Dr. Edith Kareko- Munene

A Three Country Study Synthesis

• Dr. Edith Kareko- Munene

I am a Doctoral level policy and leadership specialist and independent consultant.

I am a product of 3 Continents - Have worked extensively throughout Africa, Europe and North America. I have directed international projects and programs and influenced policies globally. I have written on population, social, humanitarian and development issues and presented papers in local and international conferences and symposia. I have won multiple prestigious international awards. Prior to founding LEAD Global Institute, I was a CEO and also an implementing international and regional partner of USAID and CDC. I am a strategic, energetic and entrepreneurial professional with practical work experience who has a great understanding of research, international development and public health issues and proven leadership and policy, organizational management expertise.

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Presentation Agenda

• Background
• Methodology
• Results
• Recommendations: Future &

Way Forward

• Conclusion

Goal for Today

To share information briefly on; A Study On The Legislation and Policy Environment For Ecological Organic Agriculture in Eastern Africa (Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda)

Background/ Project Context

• The study was conducted in three countries

namely; Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda.

• It was coordinated by Biovision Africa Trust

(BvAT) in collaboration with PELUM Kenya

• On behalf of the Continental Steering

Committee (CSC), Swedish Society for Nature Conservation (SSNC) and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC).

The Purpose

• The Ecological Organic Agriculture Initiative was established in

response to the African heads of states and governance decision.

• It is a landmark in Africa that is motivated by challenges

brought by this renewed interest and commitment by the African leaders to support organic agriculture (EOA, 2015)

• The overall goal is to mainstream Ecological Organic

Agriculture into national agricultural production systems by 2025 in order to improve quality of life for African citizens

The Global Advocacy Project (GAP)

• The Global Advocacy Project (GAP) is part of the EOA Initiative

supported by Swedish Society for Nature Conservation and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.

• The project aims to stimulate and strengthen partner organizations in

their capacity to catalyze change with respect to greater policy attention to EOA programs and investments, in order to enable the establishment

• f relevant legislation and regulations and to allocate resources to build

capabilities in various key areas including extension, education, market development etc.

Study’s Rationale

• The EOA initiative in Africa since 2012 has been implemented in

four (4) countries in Eastern Africa (Tanzania, Uganda, Ethiopia and Kenya) and four (4) in West Africa (Benin, Mali, Nigeria, Senegal).

• The main challenge so far in realizing the full potential of EOA is

the absence of enabling national policies on EOA which is the biggest obstacle hindering African governments to develop sustainable, resilient and productive farming systems (EOA, 2015).

• This is the most pressing challenge EOA study wanted to

address

Specifically, the study was carried out to assess and establish:

• The role of different institutions, including government, non-governmental
• rganizations and other stakeholders in the EOA initiatives
• Conduct a mapping of the existing EOA policy structures that can be

strengthened in each country

• Establish the challenges that the countries are facing as they aim to get

the national organic policies enacted

• Review available policies (if any) to determine the gaps and opportunities

for change

• Make recommendations for possible advocacy interventions for promoting

EOA initiatives.

The Strategy

• Focus was on how agricultural policies are formulated,

developed and delivered in general

• Particular interest was on ecological organic agriculture

(EOA)/OA in order to stimulate discussion among policymakers, practitioners, farmers and development partners on policy interventions (content) and implementation and determine their merit, worth, or value in terms of improving the social, environmental and economic conditions

• f different stakeholders.

Policy Making

Public Policy Making Defined: – When government decides to take action in response to problems or issues raised by people

• r groups as they operate in our political systems

The EOA /OA Definition Issue

• The definition of ecological organic agriculture is a

matter of debate and semantics in the three countries and indeed around the world.

• However, allthe definitions agree that it implies the

application of agronomic, biological and mechanical methods of production in place of the use of synthetic chemical inputs.

• Some of the synonyms encountered during the study

included organic agriculture, organic farming, ecological agriculture, permaculture and traditional agriculture.

Policy making process (Anderson)

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Problem identification and agenda setting Policy formation Adoption Implementation Evaluation

Policy and Politics

means INFLUENCING

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Policy & Politics (Mason, Talbott & Leavitt, 1993)

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Competing sets of values Competing sets of interests

Multiple interest groups Influencing Policy makers Actors Idea/Resources Value choices Decision making Policy Politics

EOA/OA Policy Making Triangle

Context Content Actors Process

One of many Policy Analysis Frameworks:

Policy Triangle

• Grounded in a political economy perspective
• Considers how all four of these elements interact to

shape policy-making.

• The framework has been used to analyze a large

number of issues, including socio economic, agriculture, education , health etc.

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Selected Theoretical Perspective

The Advocacy Coalition Framework

• The study was guided by the advocacy coalition framework (ACF).
• This theoretical framework enabled a deeper understanding of

the different factors that come to play in policy making processes since ecological organic agriculture/ organic agriculture continues to evolve with changing technologies and socioecological conditions in Eastern Africa.

• Some requirements are based on scientific evidence, whereas
• thers are driven by ideology.

Advocacy Coalition Framework

Type of political system

Policy formulation Implementation Policy impact

Figure 3: Adapted Advocacy Coalition Framework by Jenkins-Smith & Sabatier (1994:181) and Birner et. al. (2011:22)

Coalition A Coalition B * Interests * Interests * Resources * Resources * Beliefs * Beliefs

Production and consumption of organic goods in the world

METHODOLOGY

The Sample And Data Source

• Three distinct classes of N= 31 stakeholders were contacted.
• Beneficiaries/ Primary Stakeholders – people the ecological organic

agriculture (EOA) initiative(s) aims to reach and who have been involved in EOA project activities to date.

• Development Partners – those who have knowledge of EOA and/or

projects and beneficiaries but who are not directly involved in policy development/formulation. This included financiers, donors and NGOs.

• Policy Development & Management – those who are directly

involved in developing and implementing policies including think tanks, government officials, , managers, staff, technical advisors and sub-contracted implementers

Country Visits

• Country visits took place from September to October

2018.

• Different structured questionnaires were administered to

identify key informants/stakeholders selected in each country.

• Data was collected through Key Informant Interviews (KII)

in each country A combination of interview guides and participatory tools including the ‘context, evidence, links’ framework was used to collect data during KIIs.

Challenges in Undertaking Personal Interviews and the Network Referrals

• Due to lack of documentation in policy processes,

network referral or “snowballing” was the main method

• f data collection employed in this study.
• Despite the fact that this method assisted in mapping out

the interaction among stakeholders and their influence, it has a major drawback in the time it takes to complete the process.

• Many of the interviewees are extremely busy people with

tight schedules and little patience for long interviews

SUMMARY OF THE FINDINGS AND RECOMENDATIONS

ETHIOPIA

NATIONALORGANIC AGRICULTURE POLICY IN ETHIOPIA

• In 2003, the Ethiopian Government started supporting the

development of organic agriculture and the team was formed to come up with the organic agriculture regulations, which became law and regulations to describe how organic products would be defined.

• The Organic Agriculture System Proclamation (Proclamation

No.488/2006) was issued and signed into law and was approved by the Parliament on 8 March 2006 which has now made it possible for Ethiopia to access new markets.

• In 2007 the Ethiopian Association of organic Agriculture was

formed, by 12 NGOs

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The National Organic Agriculture Development Policy Process

• Following the CAADP Ethiopia Compact, signed in September

2009, Ethiopia completed preparation of the Agriculture Sector Policy and Investment Framework (PIF).

• The framework was designed to provide prioritized

investment areas to drive Ethiopia’s agricultural growth and transformation, and also outlined criteria for prioritizing and ranking future investments. The implementation of PIF included investment programs of Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (FDRE) Government- and donor- supported projects between 2010 and 2020.

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Policy Making Process

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Policy Concern Policy Analysis and Options Draft Policy Formulation Stakeholder Dialogue Lower House Upper House Act and Legal Notice Strategy

Rural Development Policy and Strategies, 2003

• Emphasizes on food production through the application
• f chemical fertilizers, improved seeds and other

technologies

• Underlines importance of using local knowledge, in

combination with ‘modern’ knowledge

Current Status

As of October 2018, Ethiopia did not have a national

• rganic agriculture only policy (NOAP) document.

It has instead an Ethiopia’s Agriculture Sector Policy and Investment Framework(2010-2020)that does not address ecological organic agriculture/ organic agriculture

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KENYA

The Policy Environment

• In Kenya, policies in support of organic agriculture

are implemented by a variety of institutions, such as NGOs, private companies and government departments.

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The reasons for its (Govt) continued caution may be

• Lack of adequate empirical data to prove that organic

farming is a sustainable production system;

• Skepticism about the potential of organic farming as a

result of the original rather confrontational approaches adopted by NGOs;

• Undeveloped markets for products;
• Undocumented success stories in organic agriculture

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Present Status of The Draft of the Kenya National Organic Agriculture Policy

Current Status

• As of October 2018, a draft policy aimed at streamlining and

promoting organic farming in the country is in the pipeline, after almost a decade-long wait.

• The draft of the organic agriculture policy developed by

agricultural experts from the Ministry of Agriculture, Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization (KALRO) and Kenya Organic Agriculture Network (KOAN) is complete and ready to be deliberated upon by the Cabinet after which it will be tabled for debate in Parliament.

• In a nutshell, the process of drafting/formulating the national
• rganic agriculture policy begun in 2009 and is now complete.

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UGANDA

The Development Of Organic Agriculture In Uganda

• The initial efforts to promote organic agriculture in

Uganda were made by rural development NGOs after the liberation war when farmers were experiencing serious agricultural production problems, high poverty levels and food insecurity.

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National Organic Agriculture Development Policy Process

• In the year 2003, stakeholders approached National Organic

Agriculture Movement of Uganda (NOGAMU) demanding for a

• policy. After several meetings with the Ministry of Agriculture,

Animal Industry (MAAIF), an organic policy development committee was constituted.

• At the moment, there are at least four key ministries whose

policy development and policy monitoring mandate relate to the development and functioning of the organic agriculture sub- sector.

• These are: the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and

Fisheries (MAAIF), the Ministry of Trade, Tourism and Industry (MTTI), Ministry of Water, Lands and Environment (MWLE) and the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development

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The Policy Framework

• Despite the lack of an explicit policy, the

development of organic agriculture has been remarkable under the existing enabling environment and legislative framework.

• Uganda’s constitution provides important principles

for the development of organic agriculture. Several acts and statutes focus on the sustainable management of natural resources and protection of the environment

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The steps for developing a national

• rganic agriculture policy in Uganda

Forward the final draft to the relevant Minister for transmission to Cabinet Obtain Cabinet approval

• 1. Mobilize resources
• 2 Establish an organic agriculture policy working group to steer the development process
• 3. Recruit a short-term consultant to prepare an issue paper
• 4.Hold a stakeholders’ workshop on the issues identified and reach a consensus on

priorities

• 5.Hold a stakeholders’ workshop on the issues identified and reach a consensus on

priorities

• 6.Prepare a draft national organic agriculture policy
• 7 Circulate the draft to all national stakeholders and district and urban authorities for

review and reaction

• 8.Hold regional consultative workshops ensuring that each district or urban authority is

adequately represented

• 9. Revise the draft policy document
• 10 Hold a national workshop to review the revised draft Finalize the National Organic

Agricultural Policy Document

Current Status

• As of October 2018, and after fifteen years have gone

by, the draft national organic agriculture policy (NOAP) document for Uganda has been reviewed and is ready to discussed at the cabinet level.

• On top of that, the action plan/ implementation plan

for the NOAP is also ready.

• That said, one major step remains before the draft

policy becomes an Act – an active tool for guidance and regulations among other things.

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26% 19% 10% 6% 23% 10% 6%

% Key Informants Contacted

Practitioners (26%) Policy Makers (19%) Development Partners (10%) Marketers/Traders (6%) Think Tanks/ Capacity Building (23%) Consumers (10%) Farmers (6%)

Gender Representation Among Key Informants Contacted

• The role of “policy

aware” women in ecological organic agriculture/ organic agriculture cannot be

• veremphasized.

65% 35%

Percentage By Gender

Male (N=20) Female (N=11)

SUMMARY OF RECOMMENDATIONS

Key Recommendations

– An EOA policy needs to be coherent with economy-wide policies in order to create an overall enabling environment conducive to achieving multiple goals – EOA Policies need to target country-specific constraints to development and to place greater emphasis on enabling well- functioning markets and innovation systems, and on investing more in people and infrastructure – Countries need to have appropriate institutional frameworks with sufficient capacity in terms of skills and resources to make and effectively implement the right EOA policy decisions.

Networking to promote information exchange and policy advocacy

• The key informants voiced the need for better

networking among organic agriculture practitioners and other stakeholders to improve the exchange of information and strengthen policy advocacy

Lack of National organic agriculture policies and institutional frameworks

• The key informants recommended the finalization of

the draft of national organic agriculture policies. These would not only make the necessary resources available, they would also enable national, regional and international development partners to identify priority areas to collaborate on or support.

Recommended Actions To Achieve Ecological Organic Agriculture / Organic Agriculture

Demand

• Create “Buy ecological organic products ” marketing campaigns to

promote the benefits of buying ecological organically grown foods.

• Expand and improve branding and labeling programs and provide

consumer education programs to help consumers identify ecological organic products at the time of purchase.

• Encourage public institutions to purchase ecologically organically

grown foods.

• Establish a few pilot programs e.g EOA demonstration farms in

schools and also in training/capacity building institutions with the help of AU and Development Partners.

Production

• To increase production of ecological organically grown foods,

improve agricultural infrastructure including agricultural shows/ fairs, irrigation systems and distribution systems/facilities.

• Support an ecological organic agriculture program which

provides public lands at reasonable cost and long-term tenure to farmers to do large scale organic farming

• Support funding scheme to repair and maintain irrigation

systems in the country since these systems could provide water at low cost to farmers.

Production

• Support multi-functional food hub facilities or food incubator

facilities to handle aggregation, processing, treatment and distribution of ecological organic products.

• To build the EOA workforce, introduce national initiatives

which provides workforce development services for agriculture and related industries.

• East African Community should adopt the” Kilimo Hai”
• rganic product standard, as the official standard for cross

border trade.

Policy and Organizational Support

• Introduce a market analysis and staffed branches of the

Ministries of Agriculture to track progress toward ecological

• rganic agriculture initiatives in the countries and food self-

sufficiency measures.

• A regional organic policy should also be developed to ensure

a harmonized approach to the sub sector across Africa.

• Adopt additional legislation to establish National Ecological

Organic Agricultural Development and Food Security Programs

Policy and Organizational Support

• The EOA Strategy should contain recommendations to

provide for pest prevention and control, research and extension services, and policy and organizational support. .

• Goals and strategies as expressed in the SDGs regarding

potential contributions towards ecological organic agriculture (EOA)/ organic farming (OF), as well as challenges which should be targeted and addressed with more effort in each country

Capacity Building

• Organizational, human and institutional capacity

must be strengthened at all levels and across formal and informal sectors for implementation to be effective.

• The lack of EOA/ OA human resources remains an
• bstacle for implementing EOA/ OA agriculture and

food-based system approaches.

Knowledge Imparting and Management

• Academic universities and other institutions of

higher learning should grant both masters and PhD level EOA/OA degrees.

• In all the three countries, there is generally a very

small number of professionals who are able to work effectively and deeply in EOA/OA or food and EOA/ OA security from the national to the local levels

Implementation

• In all the three countries, there is a need for

increased capacity from the bottom to the top for implementation of EOA/OA initiatives to be effective.

Processing organic produce

• Key Informants recommended lobbying governments to

invest in much needed research to develop cost-effective and efficient processing equipment and facilities.

• With the numerous medicinal plants available in the

Eastern Africa region the some key informants were of the view that that medicinal-based organic micro- enterprises and organic pesticide industries could be viable so long as the processing equipment was appropriate and affordable and the owners were equipped with necessary technical knowledge.

Processing organic produce

• They recommended that Biovision Africa Trust and

its partners organize technical study visits to explore the viability of such ideas in more detail, with the focus on identifying and documenting the viability of production, processing and marketing of organic medicinal plants and organic pesticides.

Multi-sectoral coordination

• For the three countries examined in this project,

most stakeholders agreed that there are other sectors that should be more engaged in the planning processes and action plans for EOA/ OA agriculture.

Multi-sectoral coordination

• Many stakeholders perceived that EOA/ OA plans are led,

by default, by the Ministry of Agriculture, which is a disadvantage for a true coordinated response. Ministries such as Health, Education, Finance, Urban Development and Women, Children and Social Welfare, and Local Development are seen as secondary.

• For a truly multi-sectoral response to EOA/ OA to

happen, these sectors need to be considered primary and need be effectively engaged from the outset

Proposed New Initiatives

• Initiatives like developing the Regional Organic logo

and funding of Regional Organics Value Chain Initiatives would help establish regional organic market opportunities in Eastern Africa leading to increased productivity, incomes, improved food security as a result of innovations and adhering to standards

Desks Handling EOA/ OA Issues

• In order to improve coordination and harmonization
• f negotiation positions pursued under bilateral,

regional and multilateral agreements, it is important that the various desks handling EOA/ OA issues be placed squarely in the Ministry of Agriculture and have departments or directorates dedicated to EOA/ OA issues only.

CONCLUSION

The Policy Formulation Environment Gap

• Gaps in ecological organic agriculture policy,

legislation and regulation persist in the three countries.

• They do not have any finalized NOAPs. This

leaves significant gaps since a country without a policy or any regulatory framework cannot enforce or regulate ecological organic agriculture claims effectively.

Rating of Countries

• The ecological organic agriculture/ organic agriculture

policy process assessment judgment here was based on a composite analysis of objective evidence, the

• bservations of key informants, and evaluation about

performance and trends over time.

• An overall rating of progress towards stated policy EOA

initiatives and objectives using the four-point rating scale: high, substantial, modest and negligible was adopted

Ethiopia’s Rating

• Ethiopia is falling short despite being the largest market

among the three countries with over 100 Million people yet there are is no stand-alone current organic policy or regulations document.

• The document that is currently in use is titled “Rural

Development Policy And Strategies.” Ecological organic agriculture /organic sector lack visible substantial government support.

• Where and when available, it has been limited and

inconsistent and for cash crops like coffee. (RATING SCORE: Negligible)

Kenya’s Rating

• Kenya’s findings indicate that there is poor intra-government

coordination between the lead Ministry (MoA) and other Ministries, Parastatals and Stakeholders.

• The “silo” mentality/ vertical approach is very pervasive and proves

to be an obstruction in the pursuit of the realization of the national

• rganic agriculture policy endeavor and the inclusion of EOA in

national agricultural research policies and programs as well as educational programs at different levels .

• The draft policy document is set to be discussed at the cabinet level.

(RATING SCORE: Modest).

Uganda’s Rating

• Uganda is leading the way in government commitment to

the ecological organic agriculture sector among the three

• countries. Uganda is a leader in this study and has a robust

network, organic production support, market support and some data.

• The draft national organic agriculture policy (NOAP)

document has been reviewed and is ready to be discussed at the cabinet level.

• On top of that, the action plan/ implementation plan for

the NOAP is also ready. (RATING SCORE: Substantial).

Conflicts and The Trend

• In policy discussions, leaders were quoted as having asked

the following questions…

• How can we talk about fish and birds when we still need to buy from

food outside the country or ask for aid to feed our people?

• Can any of your ecologically sound production suggestions produce

as much produce as the conventional ones?

• How can we adequately feed our future expanding population with

ecologically sound systems?

• The declaration that needs to be made is that conventional

agriculture can certainly not feed the future as it is not sustainable, but EOA is sustainable and productive.

• For this, stakeholders and researchers have to show convincing

evidence that only ecological, holistic, systems thinking based approaches really work in the long run

• Key informants in the three countries indicated that societal

and government attitudes need to shift towards perceiving

• rganic agriculture as a “friend” and not a “foe” to

conventional farming; there needs to be a mind-set change and actively involve the media in trying to achieve this goal

• Evidence/success stories are needed to show that EOA as
• pposed to conventional agriculture as doing far more in:

• Seed (farmer varieties, options by context versus released varieties)
• Fertilizer ecologically friendly vs conventional commercial fertilizers
• Pesticides (herbicides & insecticides) ecologically friendly vs

conventional commercial pesticides

• Soil, land and irrigation overuse and pollution vs sustainable

environmentally friendly management

• Technology, energy, machinery, storage and processing developed in

an exploitative vs assisting role

• Socio-economic issues like equity, gender and holistic development vs

GDP and larger mega companies with fewer wealthy multi-lateral corporations

This study has hopefully added an important dimension and understanding of the EOA/OA legislation and policy formulation environment in Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda as well as many essential areas for current and future effort.

Closing Remarks…

The birthright of all living things is health. This law is true for soil, plant, animal and man: the health of these four is one connected chain. Any weakness or defect in the health of any earlier link is passed onto the next and succeeding link, until it reaches the last, namely, the man.” Sir Albert Howard, 1945 (English Botanist and Organic Farming Pioneer)

BE THE CHANGE

Contact Information

Thank you, Merci!

• Dr. Edith Kareko- Munene

LEAD Global Institute Ltd Te Tel: +254(0)703115454

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