The Chairman of the Biovision Africa Trust Board of Trustees Mr. Andreas Schriber officially signed the contract for the 2nd Phase of EOA Initiative under the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) grants. The signing took place during his recent official visit to Biovision Africa Trust’s Office in Nairobi on 7th May 2019. The contract is for a grant of over 6.3 million US dollars for a period of 4 years starting May 2019 to April 2023. This is in addition to the previous grant of about 7.5 million US dollars. Mr. Schriber, who is also the CEO and Co-founder of the Swiss based NGO Biovision Foundation for Ecological Development, signed this contract in presence of Dr. David Amudavi, the Executive Director of Biovision Africa Trust, and Ms. Venancia Wambua, the EOA Initiative Project Manager. The team is excited about the second phase and having been at the core of the first phase, they look forward to bringing on board lessons drawn from implementing the first phase. The second […]

PELUM Uganda is the new Country Lead Organization (CLO) for the EOA Initiative in Uganda. PELUM Uganda is part of the PELUM Association – a regional network of over 220 civil society organizations in 12 countries in East, Central and Southern Africa working in the area of participatory ecological land use management. The network strives to improve the livelihoods of small-scale farmers and the sustainability of farming communities, by fostering ecological land use management. Other organizations selected during the process are; Uganda Marty’s University to lead the Research and Applied knowledge Pillar, Eastern and Southern Africa Small Scale Farmers’ Forum (ESAFF) Uganda to implement the Information, Communication and Extension Pillar and Kulika Uganda was selected to lead in the implementation of the Value Chain and Market Development Pillar. These selections were made in a multi-stakeholder process that brought together different stakeholders across Uganda. The process also involved a due diligence exercise by a selection team comprising members from BvAT and PELUM Kenya. The Biovision Africa Trust (BvAT) is the Lead […]

Mr. Musdalafa Okello Lyaga, Radio Assistant at the Biovision Africa Trust (BvAT) for the FCP’s TOF Radio was among 20 Food Journalists Celebrated on World Press Freedom Day by Food Tank. The day is marked annually on 3rd of May as proclaimed by the UN General Assembly in December 1993, following the recommendation of UNESCO’s General Conference. The World Press Freedom Day is a day to recognize the principles of press freedom that support journalists—and the challenges they face daily to inform the world. Journalists face attacks on their independence from many fronts: censoring, backlash, and threats from governments, corporations, and more. On this day, the world also pays tribute to journalists who have lost their lives on assignment. To honor the journalists that have advocated for better resources for farmers, improved food policies, healthier options for all people, and more, Food Tank highlighted 20 journalists with major contributions. With the help of journalists who provide today’s news, the world learned more about famine in Yemen, South Sudan, and Nigeria; […]

On the 23rdof May 2019, the Executive Director of Biovision Africa Trust (BvAT), Dr. David Amudavi and the Coordinator of the AU led EOA-I Continental Secretariat, Mr. Alex Mutungi hosted the Co-Founder and Director for International Development of Access Agriculture, Dr. Paul Van Mele for a partnership meeting. Access Agriculture is an international non-profit organisation with head office in Belgium and with regional offices in Kenya, Benin, Bangladesh and Bolivia. Based on the demand of the community of agricultural extension service providers, agricultural universities, government staff and farmer organisations in developing countries, and with backing of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), Access Agriculture was founded in 2012 to enable South-South exchange on and access to quality farmer training videos to secure sustainable livelihoods of smallholder farmers and users of natural resources. BvAT is hosting the Ecological Organic Agriculture (EOA) Secretariat and overseeing the implementation of EOA projects across Africa (Mali, Senegal, Benin, Nigeria, Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda, Tanzania and now moving to Rwanda in the Phase II of […]

The BvAT team in KALRO Katumani Machakos has been honored for their efforts in promoting youth involvement in agriculture in the region. The team was identified as one of the organizations connecting young people to Agriculture by the FAO and they will be supported to participate in an open forum where young entrepreneurs in the agricultural sector will be invited to showcase their projects in Machakos Town on 24th April 2019. Other young people will be invited to come and learn. The team was also requested as a build up to the event, to market it in their radio programs on Mbaitu fm. The honor came about because of a program they did early last month (in March) on youth and agriculture. Join me in congratulating the team for their hard work – Kodos to the Machakos team!!

During the launch of the Knowledge Centre for Organic Agriculture in Africa at Biofach in Nurnberg, Germany on 15 February 2019, Dr. Stefan Schmitz, Deputy Director General at the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), noted that “Agriculture is not just key to fighting poverty but is also critical to food security and an economic engine of growth”. He noted that with productive land shrinking efforts are needed to ensure food production is in line with the environment. With the current trend of depletion of resources and climate change, Africa is likely to feel more strongly the consequences. He advised that the entire food and agricultural systems therefore need more improvement, modernization and ecologically sustainable practices. He cautioned that, “Business as usual is not an option and that Organic farming is the way to go”. He reported that only about 2% of land globally is managed organically and this has to change. Organic agriculture is the key to sustainable intensification, strengthening health of soils, ecosystems, water retention […]

Over the last two decades, the development of Organic Agriculture has gained momentum in Africa. Agricultural land under organic farming is steadily increasing according to data released by FiBL. Dr. David Amudavi, the BvAT Director, said this when he spoke at the Biofach Session on the Global Organic Market Overview attended by over 200 people. The session looked deeper into the market developments and reflected about trends and strategic market positioning following presentation of new statistic figures on the first day of the fair. Presenting on the African perspective, he noted that according to the latest FiBL data, Africa had almost 2.1 million hectares of agricultural land under organic farming in 2017, which is 0.2 percent of the continent’s total agricultural area and 3 percent of the global organic agricultural area. This is an increase of about 255,000 hectares or 14 percent compared to 2016, and it increased by more than 2 million hectares from the 52,000 hectares in 2000. The current organic size area is from 44 countries that […]

The Biovision Africa Trust executive director, Dr. David Amudavi, was among thousands of participants from different countries and across different sectors that attended the Berlin International Green Week (IGW), supported by BMZ. The event took place from 18th to 27th January 2019 in Berlin, Germany. Founded in Berlin in the Golden 20s (1926), IGW is a one-of-a-kind international exhibition of the food, agriculture and gardening industries. IGW is the origin of the Global Forum for Food and Agriculture (GFFA). This is where over 80 international ministries and food producers meet – their displays reveal the fascinating world of the food and beverage industries. Dr. Amudavi attended this event courtesy of the BMZ support. The event brought together; Over 1,700 exhibitors with over 100,000 products from all over the world. 300 technical conferences. Food industry representatives, wholesalers, retailers, caterers. Agricultural importers. International specialists from all fields of agriculture, forestry, horticulture and commercial fishing. Agricultural policy and administration experts. During his participation in the event, Dr. Amudavi had positive interactions with the […]

German Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) is set to support a network of regional knowledge hubs for organic farming in Africa through Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ). The new organic knowledge centers will be based in Eastern, Western and Southern Africa with an already established Organic Hub in Egypt, North Africa. Biovision Africa Trust based in Kenya is set to take lead in the coordination, establishment and running of the BMB/GIZ supported Knowledge Hub for Organic Agriculture in Eastern Africa with its consortium of regional partners – IFOAM OI, CIAT, ICIPE and Access Agriculture for a period of 5 years. The project will be implemented in 6 countries of Kenya, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi. This comes after BvAT with its consortium of partners submitted a convincing and comprehensive proposal for setting up the Eastern Africa regional hub and went through all the approval stages of initial screening, due diligence assessment by independent assessors and further institutional assessment by GIZ and BMZ. BvAT passed the test. […]