AGRICULTURE NEWS - Africa is coming up with its own solutions to the challenges posed by the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) pandemic, according to a statement by the African Development Bank (AfDB).

The bank’s Covid-19 Response Facility was in the process of mobilising $10 billion (about R194 billion) to provide financial assistance to African countries to fight the pandemic.

It raised a $3 billon (R57 billion) COVID-19 bond, the proceeds of which were earmarked to address fiscal challenges, as well as to secure the procurement of medicines, vaccinations, ventilators and other health-related expenditures and feeding programmes, agro-input subsidies and other socio-economic interventions.

Atsuko Toda, Director of Agricultural Finance and Rural Development at the AfDB, said it was vital that Africa maintained adequate food reserves, avoided protectionist policies and promoted value chains that linked domestic and international markets.

Read the full article here on the Caxton publication, Farmer's Weekly