“Data is king” and “data is the new gold” are phrases often heard and reiterated in almost every discussion around challenges to not only increasing intra-African trade, but also to strengthening Africa’s resilience and moving the continent toward becoming food secure. That access to timely, reliable and high-quality data is a challenge is not a debate at this point; there seems to be consensus on this. What is critical is how we collectively work toward addressing this challenge. Increased intra-African trade is key to strengthening the continent’s resilience to shocks. We have lived through very stark examples — the COVID-19 pandemic, the Russia-Ukraine War and the continuous challenges presented by climate change — that impact our food supply and food and nutrition security.

In the rapidly changing world we live in, data is becoming more and more critical to facilitating fast and accurate decision-making by key stakeholders in the public and private sectors. To help address this challenge, the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) and Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), with support from development partners; Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO); USAID; the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF); and the Rockefeller Foundation (RF), have spearheaded the development of a Regional Food Balance Sheet (RFBS). The RFBS aims to help provide reliable, timely and accurate data, and to support evidence-based decision-making in a rapidly changing environment. The RFBS system ingests data from a variety of public and private sources and leverages analytics and tools to develop near real-time and forward-looking food balance estimates. The RFBS is anchored within the COMESA framework, with a mandate from member states for the development of a COMESA-wide data platform to inform policy and decision-making.

Using a user-centric design, the RFBS platform turns data into insights that can facilitate data-driven decisions around production, trade policy and stock management. National governments can use this data to support food security and trade-related decision-making; the private sector can use the data to support business operations, and production forecasts can inform decisions on trade and investments. The donor and international community can use this data to support strategic funding decisions, such as providing clear path/use case for partners to support ground-truth data collection/harmonization efforts in the region.

Addressing challenges related to intra-African food trade requires a multifaceted approach that considers various aspects of data collection, management and utilization. As part of the ongoing work on the RFBS, COMESA has, and will continue to, engage national governments and the private sector in the six pilot countries — Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Uganda, Malawi and Zambia. These engagements are critical as they help sensitize/increase awareness about the initiative, evaluate the progress made in the implementation of the initiative, appreciate the challenges encountered by the member states in the data collection, follow up on the performance of each member state structures put in place to support the initiative, share analytical reports from the platform and advocate for support and buy-in from the member states and the private sector. For the RFBS to be expanded to cover more crops and more countries, as well as to be a sustainable tool to support evidence-based decision-making, the following is needed:

• Mobilization of sufficient resources for data collection, analysis and dissemination.
• Coordination of organizations to provide support to countries for harmonized methodologies and approaches for data collection.
• Cooperation between countries for harmonized data collection methodologies and approaches that facilitate comparison of statistics (amenable to comparative analysis).
• Consistently avail data that is ingested into the platform.
• Establish standardized protocols and formats for data collection and storage across countries to ensure consistency and compatibility. This could involve creating a common database or platform that facilitates the sharing of information among participating nations.
• Invest in training programs and workshops to improve data collection, analysis and interpretation skills among individuals and institutions involved in the food trade. This includes training on using digital tools for data management and analysis.
• Foster collaborations between governments, private sector entities, research institutions and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to leverage resources, expertise and technologies for better data collection and analysis. Public-private partnerships can also facilitate access to private sector data that might not be accessible otherwise.
• Implement robust data security measures to protect sensitive information while ensuring that data is accessible to relevant stakeholders. Establishing protocols for data sharing that respect privacy concerns is crucial for fostering trust and encouraging participation.

COMESA will continue to engage stakeholders in the MVP countries, continuing to learn, improve and make adjustments, and with support from the Food Trade Coalition for Africa, convene dialogues to share lessons and best practices, and continuously receive feedback, as this is a critical aspect of the process.

This post was co-authored with:

• Providence Mavubi, director, Industry and Agriculture, COMESA.
• Protase Echessah, senior specialist, Food Trade, AGRA.