A single word that faithfully describes all the richness and diversity of the Fert International Meetings which took place from October 15 to 22, 2022 in Ivory Coast. This event was an opportunity for 48 members of Fert and partner organizations to meet Ivorian farmers and discuss together around a common goal: improving the living conditions of African farmers and their families.
Human and multi-country meetings
Excerpt from the news of the Ivorian television channel Business24 (in french)
After Kenya in 2019, it was therefore Ivory Coast that hosted the “International Fert Meetings” for a week, bringing together 34 technicians and 14 farmers from 6 others African countries and France. For this new edition, the Meetings have opened their doors to North Africa (Morocco and Tunisia) and to 6 employees of Unigrains, a major partner of Fert for 40 years.
These Meetings were organized as part of the TransFert program with the financial support of the Agence française de développement and Unigrains.
« Thanks to numerous field visits, particularly to producer organizations and young people in training, Fert’s action has become more concrete for us. The meetings also allowed us, through the presence of delegations from different countries, to have an overall vision of its approach, which is original, collaborative and centered on farmers initiatives. A week rich in sharing and a perfect organization! »
Professional and agricultural meetings
From Korhogo to Agboville via Bouaké, more than fifty actors united around the Fert approach went to meet Ivorian farmers at the heart of Fert’s actions.
Since 2018 Fert has concentrated its activities in 3 regions: Poro, Bouaké, Agnéby Tiassa. It supports farmers and their organizations in diversifying and improving agricultural production systems, training of farmers, especially young people, and developing services that enable them to make a better living from their profession. In total, nearly 1,500 producers and their families are supported by Fert in Ivory Coast.
Map of Fert actions in Ivory Coast
Participants from Burkina Faso, France, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Morocco and Tunisia were able to meet nearly 250 producers of corn, market gardening products, cocoa… and small livestock supported by Fert through their groups and cooperatives.
The teams also had the opportunity to discover the Center de Formation Agricole et Rurale (CFAR) des Savanes (70 young girls and sons of peasants in training) – created with the support of the Louis Dreyfus Corporate Foundation and LDC Côte d’Ivoire – as well as the farms of the first young people trained at CFAR and supported in their professional integration.
Friendly and cultural meetings
These Meetings were also an opportunity to share thoughts and learnings from each other’s experiences. In this sense, an evening of exchanges was organized to allow each delegation to present its country, its culture and its agriculture.
Kenyan macadamia, Burkinabe cowpea, Malagasy tamarind candy or even French red wine, the various protagonists were able to discover and taste many products specific to each country while discussing technical itineraries, processing and marketing of agricultural products.
“Even in the celebrations and entertainment, we always kept the Fert spirit. Through the visit of the booths and the farmers’ presentation, this evening allowed us to see what the producers are doing elsewhere and to discover their practices and know-how. The activities facilitated exchanges between delegations and made it possible to deepen knowledge of the agricultural practices of each country. In Malawi, for example, I discovered that they produce coarse beans, which are quite different from the ones we have back home in Burkina Faso. Pulses have great potential for them, as they do for us.”
Technical and economic meetings
A workshop made it possible to share technical and economic consulting practices from 4 countries: Malawi, Morocco, Madagascar, Ivory Coast. These practices based on collection and recording tools, analysis methods and facilitation techniques help to make technical-economic advice a decision-making tool for farmers.
human multi-country professional agricultural friendly cultural technical Economic Meetings !
Rich from all these dimensions, the Fert International Meetings have enabled all employees and partners to get to know each other and maintain a common culture around a vision of agricultural development, values and an approach.
Fert and the partner producer organizations send their very sincere thanks to Unigrains and AFD, which have supported them for 40 years and have co-financed these Meetings. Fert would also like to thank the Ivorian agencies Dim Voyage and Strategy Communication for having provided logistics and communication with great professionalism respectively.
