New Policy Playbook Provides Recipes for Successful Implementation of the Kampala Declaration

Malabo Montpellier Panel presents proven lessons to boost food security as well as agricultural productivity, trade, finance and resilience across Africa.

KIGALI, RWANDA, December 18, 2025 /EINPresswire.com/ -- A panel of global agricultural and policy experts has released a new playbook to support African countries as they begin implementing the Kampala Declaration on building resilient and sustainable agrifood systems from January 1, 2026.

"Recipes for Success 2: Policy Innovations to Achieve the Kampala Declaration Goals" synthesizes lessons from 70 country case studies conducted by the Malabo Montpellier Panel based on 16 flagship reports published since 2017, offering practical and replicable approaches for African governments, nonstate actors, and development partners for the third phase of the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) 2026-2035.

CAADP, the foundational framework for Africa's agricultural development, was launched in 2003 following the endorsement of the Maputo Declaration. In 2014, the Malabo Declaration set forth seven commitments to be achieved by 2025. These included ending hunger in Africa by 2025, halving poverty through inclusive agricultural growth, and enhancing the resilience of livelihoods and production systems to climate variability and other related risks.

Africa has experienced sustained economic growth over the last two decades, with a steady increase in agricultural production. Despite progress, the continent has faced severe setbacks from climate shocks, the COVID-19 pandemic, and global commodity market disruptions linked to the Russia-Ukraine war.

In response to these pressing challenges, the Kampala Declaration and the associated CAADP Strategy and Action Plan (2026–2035) were adopted by African Union Member States in 2025, proposing a holistic agrifood systems approach to shape the next decade of Africa's agrifood system transformation. With case studies from 22 countries and lessons from Regional Economic Communities, Recipes for Success 2 maps the Panel's body of evidence against the six commitments outlined in the Kampala Declaration.

"The Kampala Declaration is an ambitious framework to make up ground on the continent's agrifood systems transformation, and the good news is that African countries already possess a rich foundation of policy innovations, institutional reforms, and programmatic successes to build on," Dr. Ousmane Badiane, Co-Chair, Malabo Montpellier Panel, and Executive Chairperson at AKADEMIYA2063. "Evidence from the Panel's work over nearly a decade shows that the success of the Kampala era would largely depend on Africa's capacity to learn from documented experiences and scale up proven solutions through coordinated and sustained action."

With this report, the Malabo Montpellier Panel presents an integrated agenda to support policy and programmatic interventions across areas such as agrifood finance, agro-processing, climate resilience, digitalization, fisheries, irrigation, mechanization, nutrition, and youth and women's empowerment.

The report offers critical recommendations and highlights relevant, successful interventions for adoption and scaling under each of the six Kampala commitments.

Intensifying sustainable food production, agro-industrialization, and trade: Achieving a 45 percent increase in output, halving postharvest losses, and tripling intra-African trade by 2035 will require sustained investment in technology, diversification, and competitive value chains. Experiences from Ethiopia, Rwanda, and Senegal provide workable models that show productivity gains rise sharply when policies align with investments in irrigation, digital advisory services, improved mechanization, and climate-smart agricultural innovations responsive to farmers' needs. Trade-enhancing reforms in Kenya, South Africa, and Uganda demonstrate that reducing tariff and non-tariff barriers can stimulate regional markets, boost competitiveness, and strengthen food availability across borders.

Boosting investment and financing for agrifood systems transformation: The Kampala Declaration calls for mobilizing at least US$100 billion in public and private investment by 2035, allocating 10 percent of national budgets to the sector, and reinvesting 15 percent of agrifood GDP annually. Examples from Morocco, Seychelles, and Zambia show that innovative financing mechanisms, including revolving funds, blended finance instruments, and results-based subsidies, have expanded access to capital for women, youth, and other small producers.

Ensuring food and nutrition security: The Kampala Declaration targets Zero Hunger by 2035, 30 percent reductions in child stunting, wasting, and overweight, and ensuring that at least 60 percent of the population can afford a healthy diet. Interventions in Malawi, Côte d'Ivoire, and Ghana show that school feeding schemes, dietary diversification incentives, strengthened safety nets, and biofortified crops, along with stronger monitoring systems to track nutrition outcomes across all ages for both females and males, have proven effective in improving dietary quality, reducing food insecurity, and building human capital.

Advancing inclusivity and equitable livelihoods: Reducing extreme poverty and narrowing the gender yield gap by half requires reforms that prioritize equitable access to productive resources. Programs that have expanded women's and youth participation in agrifood systems, as observed in Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, and Zimbabwe, demonstrate that key enablers of inclusivity include secure land and resource rights, tailored financial services, access to mechanization and digital tools, and agricultural innovation hubs that enable young people, in particular, to transition from being job seekers to job creators.

Building resilient agrifood systems: Protecting 40 percent of households from shocks requires a shift from reactive to anticipatory governance. Successful programs in Niger, Mali, Zambia, and Morocco show that effective delivery of scalable technologies, such as solar irrigation, drought-tolerant seed varieties, and climate-informed advisory services, combined with early warning systems and risk financing mechanisms, have strengthened countries' ability to withstand such shocks. Investments in restoration, circular economy approaches, and sustainable land and water management can ensure long-term resilience for households engaged in agrifood-system-related livelihoods, as demonstrated in Ghana and Uganda. Furthermore, Mozambique and Malawi demonstrate that infrastructure and cross-border cooperation can turn aquatic resources into a pillar of resilient, nutrition-sensitive food systems.

Strengthening agrifood systems governance: Evidence indicates that countries that have invested in coherent policies, data-driven planning, accountable institutions, and participatory decision-making have achieved faster and more sustainable results in transforming their agrifood systems. As observed in Rwanda and Senegal, inter-ministerial coordination, regular performance reviews, and transparent regulatory systems, especially those designed around the use of digital technologies, enhance trust, efficiency, and investment attractiveness.

"The wealth of evidence in this report serves as a practical reference for African governments, development partners, and private-sector actors to advance the ambitions of the Kampala Declaration," said Prof. Joachim von Braun, Co-Chair, Malabo Montpellier Panel at the Center for Development Research (ZEF), University of Bonn. "The African research communities will play a key role providing guidance to implementation actions at continental and country level."

As the continent embarks on the implementation phase of the Kampala Declaration, these policy solutions, along with robust communication and advocacy strategies, can serve as a blueprint for continentwide implementation, scaling, and monitoring to accelerate impact. 

Donna Bowater
Marchmont Communications
donna@marchmontcomms.com

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