expanding agriculture and food security activities in ... - part - usaid

1. PURPOSE OF ASSESSMENT REPORT
USAID/Sudan’s funding for its Economic Growth portfolio has been primarily used to improve road
infrastructure to help Southern Sudan start its recovery process. Recently, with a promise of significant
additional funding, the Mission is at the early stages of designing interventions to support the recovery of
the agricultural sector and to support the Government of Southern Sudan’s goal of increasing food
production, USAID/Sudan requested that an assessment take place to explore options and priorities for
expanding its agricultural and food security programming with Fiscal Year 2009 funds. The assessment
report and its recommendations would be the basis for developing a statement of work for
USAID/Sudan’s new agricultural productivity and marketing project.
2. METHODOLOGY OF ASSESSMENT
The Scope of Work for the design team clearly articulated the Mission’s expectations that the team would
carry out extensive consultations with stakeholders in and outside of Sudan – GOSS at all levels, NGOs,
donors, international organizations and the private sector, especially farmers and farmers’ groups.
The team stopped in Nairobi, Kenya to meet with the USAID/East Africa Office to get USAID regional
perspective on developing South Sudan’s agricultural sector. The team also met with other organizations,
including the African Union Interafrica Bureau for Animal Resources (AU IBAR), the International
Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) and the International Livestock Research
Institute (ILRI) that have regional responsibilities and projects with which Southern Sudan could link.
In Southern Sudan, the team gathered information from a wide variety of sources and stakeholders over
the course of three weeks. The focus of questions was on a) how to boost agricultural productivity and
increase market access for large numbers of small farmers in the Equatoria States, to contribute to the
Government of Southern Sudan’s priority of increasing food production; and b) identify gaps where
USAID assistance could add high value. The team used a value chain approach to explore relationships
along the crops and livestock chains and identify gaps. It also gathered information on the role and the
ability of Southern Sudan public, private and NGO sectors to provide services to the agricultural sector.
Key donors, donor groups, non-governmental agencies and other international organizations were
interviewed to gather information on types of interventions, experiences, and lessons learned relating to
developing the agricultural potential in the Equatoria States. The team also strived to determine what
gaps exist in current activities that a new USAID program could fill. In some cases the team received
documents from various agencies that provided more information. These were passed on to
USAID/Sudan to build up their library and information portal.
At the same time, the team reviewed a wide range of documents to obtain more analytical information
about agricultural systems, poverty, gender and other topics relevant to our design task.
Several days were spent in the field where we visited selected counties to gain an understanding of the
existing conditions, practices and institutions operating at farmer, county and state levels. The team met
with government officials at the state and county levels to gain information on government priorities and
ongoing activities. We visited several projects that were or are currently working with farmers to glean
lessons learned and best practices. We also randomly interviewed farmers to learn about their practices,
how they access services and markets, and the constraints they face. Lastly, we visited several markets
and interviewed many of the women petty traders selling agricultural commodities to determine origin,
quality and quantity of produce, and to determine what constraints they face in marketing. In one town,
EXPANDING AGRICULTURE AND FOOD SECURITY ACTIVITIES IN SOUTHERN SUDAN 1