English

Given the importance of agriculture in West Africa, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) asked the West and Central African Council for Agricultural Research and Development (CORAF/WECARD) to undertake an in-depth  assessment of agricultural research capacity in the region focusing on key institutional, human resource, and financial resource issues. The assessment is a critical input into the development of national and regional agricultural policy recommendations, which will in turn feed into a regional agricultural research strategy for West Africa.

Countries in West Asia and North Africa (WANA) share a number of common challenges, including rapid population growth, progressive exploitation and exhaustion of water resources, land degradation, and the adverse consequences of climate change. Moreover, lack of political stability constitutes a key barrier to food security and economic development in a large number of countries. Importing roughly half of its food needs, WANA is the most food-import-dependent region of the world.

As of 2012, most Anglophone Caribbean countries employed fewer than 10 agricultural FTE researchers and spent less than $2 million PPP dollars on agricultural R&D (in constant 2011 prices). Agricultural research in the region is primarily conducted in Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago and by the regional agency CARDI.

With more than 8,400 agricultural researchers in FTEs—most qualified to the PhD degree level—Egypt’s agricultural R&D system is among the world’s largest in terms of human resource capacity; of these researchers, three-quarters are employed at the country’s principal agricultural R&D agency, ARC.

Agricultural R&D spending grew by nearly a quarter during 2009–2012, mostly driven by higher salary- related expenses following large-scale staff recruitment by ARC.

Agricultural R&D in Panama is primarily funded by the government. In 2012, for example, the country’s main agricultural R&D agency, IDIAP, was 94 percent government funded.

Investment in agricultural R&D in Panama increased somewhat during 2006–2012, despite some fluctuations, but growth in spending as a share of AgGDP actually reflected a decline in AgGDP levels.

Agricultural R&D spending grew moderately during 2009–2012, in inflation adjusted terms, due to growth in the overall number of researchers employed in the higher education and nonprofit sectors, and increased salary levels and sales revenues at the country’s main agricultural agency, ICTA.

Nonprofit producer organizations play an important role in funding sugarcane and coffee research in Guatemala; in 2012, these activities accounted for a quarter of the country’s total agricultural R&D spending.