Despite a food crisis affecting nearly 52 million people across West Africa, the region has the potential to develop resilient agricultural systems.
This is the message delivered by Bintia Stephen-Tchicaya, the newly appointed Acting Subregional Coordinator of the FAO Subregional Office for West Africa, who advocates for innovation, diversified partnerships, and inclusiveness to drive this transformation.
Interview excerpts by APANEWS.
You have just assumed leadership of the FAO Subregional Office for West Africa. What are your immediate priorities to promote inclusive, competitive, sustainable, and nutrition-sensitive food systems?
It is with great honor that I take on the role of Acting Subregional Coordinator for the FAO in West Africa. I am fully aware of the challenges ahead, but I also see immense opportunities to sustainably transform our food systems.
My immediate priority is to work with countries across the subregion and subregional institutions to develop food systems that are more inclusive, competitive, sustainable, and nutrition-sensitive.
Our region is facing complex challenges: persistent food insecurity, climate change, conflict, and the vulnerability of agricultural systems. But it also boasts tremendous potential, expertise, and inspiring initiatives. That’s why my focus is on collaborating with countries to transform our food systems around the “Four Betters”:
Better production by supporting a more productive, inclusive, and resilient agriculture;Better nutrition by improving access to healthy, diversified, and affordable food for all;Better environment by promoting sustainable practices that protect our natural resources;Better life by creating economic and social opportunities, particularly for youth, women, and rural communities.
To bring this vision to life, we will focus our efforts on four strategic areas: enhancing the resilience of food systems to climate, economic, and security shocks; promoting the inclusion of small-scale producers, women, and youth in agricultural value chains; improving nutrition by supporting policies that integrate nutrition into agricultural strategies; and strengthening governance and data to enable evidence-based decision-making.
However, transforming food systems is not enough if we do not protect the most vulnerable. That’s why the FAO is committed to supporting countries in adapting and strengthening social protection systems for agricultural populations, including through the integration of farmers into social safety nets and by building national capacity.
What, in your view, are the main challenges currently facing West Africa in terms of food security and agricultural development?
For several years, West Africa and the Sahel have been grappling with a food crisis caused by a combination of long-standing structural and temporary, interconnected factors.
Data from the Harmonized Framework assessments indicate that since 2016, the Sahel and West Africa have faced a continuous series of major food and nutrition crises, leading to a sharp increase in the number of people requiring urgent food and nutritional assistance.
Between 2018 and 2025, the number of food-insecure people in ECOWAS, UEMOA, CILSS member states, and Cameroon rose from about 11 million to nearly 52 million during the projected period (June–August 2025).
Conflict-related figures are equally concerning, with more than 10,000 violent incidents recorded in 2022 alone, compared to 14,000 over the entire 2015–2019 period. This represents a 115% increase in security incidents in northern coastal countries.
In addition, extreme weather events are a major aggravating factor in the food crisis, directly impacting the livelihoods of communities that rely heavily on the agropastoral sector. This year’s floods are a striking example, affecting over 7.1 million people and inundating nearly 3.8 million hectares of farmland.
Given the decline in international funding, what strategies do you plan to implement to sustainably mobilise resources?
Indeed, achieving resource mobilization goals is a major challenge. In Niger, for instance, the share of funding needs covered by the Subregional Office remains modest (under 20%), with funding levels experiencing sharp fluctuations: from 85% in 2022 to only 34% in 2023.
Several factors explain this decrease: earmarked funding that limits flexibility, restrictive conditions imposed by donors, an overall decline in development aid, economic and political constraints, and the fact that development banks now primarily channel funds through governments.
In response, we must adopt a proactive, diversified strategic approach: public-private partnerships (PPPs), multi-donor frameworks, climate and green financing, stronger engagement with non-traditional donors (emerging countries, philanthropic foundations, regional financial institutions), enhanced interagency cooperation, community and civil society mobilization, as well as South-South and triangular cooperation.
How do you intend to work with governments and partners to strengthen the resilience of food systems to climate shocks?
The FAO’s 2022–2031 Strategic Framework aims to help achieve the 2030 Agenda by transforming agrifood systems to make them more efficient, inclusive, resilient, and sustainable.
In Senegal, we supported the update of the agro-sylvo-pastoral orientation law, which now includes fisheries, food systems, and climate change. The FAO is providing technical assistance to set up a farmers’ registry—an essential tool to strengthen links between social protection and rural development strategies.
Operationally, the FAO has developed participatory approaches such as farmer field schools and Dimitra clubs, which after years of implementation, have proven effective in driving behavior change and strong community engagement. These approaches are now being scaled up by the government and civil society organizations.
On the environmental front, the FAO supports the Senegalese government in implementing the Reforestation Agency and the Great Green Wall program, a bold initiative aiming to establish seventy resilient green hubs across arid and semi-arid areas between 2023 and 2032.
In terms of agricultural innovation, what levers do you intend to activate to support West African farmers, particularly youth employment and women’s empowerment?
Senegal is one of the African countries participating in the FAO-led “1,000 Digital Villages” initiative, which promotes rural transformation through agricultural digitalization.
The FAO office in Senegal has provided technical assistance to implement this initiative via the “Digital Inclusion and Agricultural Services in Africa (SAIDA)” project.
In 2021, this initiative enabled the registration and training of 300,000 smallholder farmers in over 3,000 villages. Some 955 technical advisory messages were distributed via text and audio in six local languages to support e-extension services.
A virtual marketing network was also launched via an e-commerce platform (www.senlouma.org), connecting agricultural value chain actors with buyers.
What role can the FAO play in strengthening early warning systems for food and climate-related crises?
In line with its mandate, the FAO is a key player in early warning systems, both nationally and subregionally. The organization already plays a role in all major components: risk assessment, monitoring, alerting, and response.
The FAO actively contributes to monitoring and alerting—particularly in food security—through its role in the regional food crisis prevention and management mechanism (PREGEC) coordinated by CILSS. The FAO also operates tools such as GIEWS (Global Information and Early Warning System), which tracks crop seasons and forecasts harvests.
Looking ahead, the FAO will maintain this support while increasing its investment in disaster risk prevention and reduction, especially through anticipatory actions implemented before crises escalate. It is precisely at the interface of early warning and rapid response that the FAO delivers real added value to the region.
How do you view the role of artificial intelligence and digital tools, particularly in addressing challenges such as cattle theft?
At the FAO, we strongly believe that innovative technologies are powerful levers to sustainably transform agriculture in Africa—especially in pastoral areas of the Sahel and West Africa.
Cattle theft remains a major challenge for herders. This issue not only threatens the livelihoods of pastoralist communities but also endangers the social and economic stability of many cross-border areas. According to some estimates, economic losses from livestock theft in West Africa amount to several million dollars annually.
As part of a pilot project, the FAO is supporting the governments of Mali and Senegal in preventing and controlling livestock theft. This initiative involves partnerships with universities and tech start-ups to test innovative solutions and strengthen national livestock identification systems.
In Senegal, three studies were recently validated in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture, Food Sovereignty, and Livestock. These focus on assessing current livestock identification and traceability systems, analyzing existing mechanisms, and evaluating the National Livestock Identification and Traceability System (SNITB).
The FAO will leverage its full expertise to support authorities in Senegal and Mali in developing a national strategy to combat livestock theft. We firmly believe that digitizing the livestock sector is an essential and innovative solution to protect herders’ livelihoods from this growing threat in West Africa.
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