8 May 2018, Addis Ababa – Major players in agricultural innovation met in Addis Ababa to match demand and supply for capacity development in agricultural innovation and broker effective partnerships to make agriculture in Ethiopia more productive and sustainable.

The marketplace, organised under the EU-funded CDAIS project, focused on niches of the Ethiopian agriculture sector with a high potential for innovation, including malt barley, animal feed, milk and chick pea production and community seed marketing.

Each of the niches presented their work and the main gaps in capacity development, while providers of capacity development talked about their work and possible areas of collaboration. In the follow-up discussions several opportunities for further cooperation between the niches, service providers and development partners were identified.  

Ethiopia’s two platforms supporting malt barley production agreed to explore way to increase their synergies to promote their common goal of enhancing import substitution for malt barely. Actors in the animal feed sector, including government and civil society, are working to renew regulations for risk assessment, management and communication. 

The Ethiopian Milk Processing Industry  Association (EMPIA) found governmental and civil society actors willing to support their efforts to introduce milk in school feeding program, while a cooperative union of chickpea growers got a willing ear from USAID to support the establishment of a processing plant to produce Shiro, a special kind of chickpea powder. In addition, the ministry of education showed interest to include the powder in the food package for schools. Another cooperative union, supporting seed producers, engaged in talks with civil society and government to improve regional marketing directives and their access to early generation seeds.