News: The Ethiopian Agricultural Transformation Agency presents its business model, impact and 10-year strategy
the overall performance of ATA over the past 10 years.
Addis Abeba, December 10/2020: The Ethiopian Agricultural Transformation Agency (ATA) has presented its Business Model & Impacts from 2010 – 2020 and its strategy for the next 10 Years at the Sheraton Addis in the presence of high-level federal and regional government officials, farmers, development partners, and other dignitaries.
The event kicked off with the opening remarks of Oumer Hussein, Minister of Agriculture where he acknowledged the journey the Ethiopian agriculture has come in a span of ten years. “It is important to take stock of what ATA has been able to contribute to the transformation of the sector” he added. “Despite the promising changes we have noticed, the sector is riddled with various problems that challenge the smallholder farmers of Ethiopia and addressing such challenges and commercializing the sector could lead Ethiopia to further exploit its agriculture potential both in crops and livestock.
Resolving the systemic bottlenecks in the crop and livestock value chains will drive inclusive growth helping us attain food security” Following the opening remarks, the journey of ATA over the past ten years was presented by ATA CEO, Khalid Bomba. During the presentation, the CEO highlighted the overall process behind the establishment of the ATA, its achievements and challenges in a span of ten years. “The success of the ATA is not the sole responsibility of the Agency; rather, it has been a combination of collective efforts and contributions ranging from the Government of Ethiopia, the Ministry of Agriculture, Regional Bureaus of Agriculture, the community of partners extending from development partners to civil society organizations to NGOs to the private sector, the farmers and DAs whose concerted efforts have made the ATA successful” he added.
Since its establishment in December 2010, the ATA has been working across four mandate areas namely, conducting Studies, Projects, Implementation Support, and Linkage and Coordination. Within these mandate areas, the organization has adopted two approaches to catalyze agricultural transformation: addressing systemic bottlenecks through the Agricultural Transformation Agenda Deliverables (TAD) and integrating solutions in high-priority commodity value-chain and geographies through the Agricultural Commercialization Cluster (ACC) program.
Under the TAD and ACC programs, the ATA has undertaken various impactful projects that have improved farming approaches, facilitated access to inputs, services and markets, and thereby improving the livelihoods of smallholder farmers.
The event also saw an independent evaluation presentation of the performance and impacts of the Agency over the past ten years by Mr. Maximo Torero Cullen, Chief Economist of Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). The presentation covered the corporate impacts of the Agency’s activities in the country in terms of projects executed, studies conducted, and other impactful activities implemented to drive agricultural transformation, growth, and poverty reduction. In its first decade of operations, the ATA has delivered over 250 studies and 45 projects, some of which are currently ongoing. It has managed to consistently deliver on its other mandate areas as well, acting as a sector coordinator, and building implementation capacity among various stakeholders in the sector. Additional presentations and panel discussions were also held on the future strategy of the agency by ATA senior directors and panelists that attended the event in person and online due to the current COVID-19 pandemic.
The Ethiopian Agriculture Transformation Agency (ATA) is an initiative of the Government of Ethiopia (GOE) established in 2010. The aim of the Agency is to promote agricultural sector transformation by supporting existing structures of government, private sector and other non-governmental partners to address systemic bottlenecks in delivering on a priority national agenda for achieving growth and food security. Dispatch
