The African Development Bank has signed two grant agreements to finance agri-business development projects through the Agriculture Fast Track Fund. Funded by the United States, Denmark, and Sweden, the Agriculture Fast Track Fund supports Africa-based agri-business SMEs by financing the development costs of agriculture infrastructure projects that span the value chain from rural feeder roads to agro-processing and marketing facilities, to out-grower schemes.

Agritech company Farmcrowdy enables British Nigerians to invest in chicken, maize and cassava farms, from more than 3,000 miles away, via their mobile phones . Farmcrowdy hopes to have 50,000 farmers by 2020. UK-based Nigerians are investing in Nigeria’s booming agricultural sector from the comfort of their homes thanks to agritech platform, Farmcrowdy. The company, launched in Nigeria in 2016, currently boasts of 10,000 acres and 7,000 signed up farmers across nine states, in Africa’s most populous country.

The East African Court of Justice (EACJ) has dismissed a petition seeking the reinstatement of an appeal of the case on the Economic Partnership Agreement between the regional bloc and European Union. A Tanzanian, Mr Castro Pius Shirima, filed the re-appeal on March 5 this year and hearing was scheduled for May 9. However, Mr Shirima or his lawyer failed to appear before the court, forcing the judges to throw out the petition for abuse of court processes.

Tuesday 8th May saw the launch of the Eastern Caribbean Regional Climate Change Implementation Plan. The Plan is the final output of the Eastern Caribbean Regional Climate Change Implementation Project which was funded by the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office and executed by Carbon Trust Advisory Ltd. and Climate Analytics in partnership with the OECS Commission.

The 18-month project will increase the competitiveness of agriculture value chains through effective public-private-producers partnerships and policy support to federal and regional Ministries of Agriculture, responsible for creating an enabling economic environment. Creating better policies and a stronger market The project titled "Technical Assistance for Institutional Capacity Building on Agriculture Value Chain and Public-Private Partnership Development" was launched in Mogadishu today and is a joint initiative by the European Union, the Ministries of Agriculture of the Federal Government of Somalia and all Federal Member States, the Federal Ministry of Planning.