Announcement: 2nd Africa Food Security & Adaptation Conference

30-31 July 2015. 2nd Africa Food Security and Adaptation Conference: Africa's Soil the New Frontier: Re-imagining Africa Food Security Now and into the Future.

Following the Nairobi Declaration of 21 August 2013 of the 1st Africa Food Security and Adaptation Conference whose recommendations where adopted by The African Ministerial Conference on the Environment (AMCEN) , where they 'recommended that the conference be convened every two years to facilitate knowledge sharing and ensure that ecosystem based adaptation actions solve crosscutting challenges including achieving the proposed "Sustainable Development Goals". Against this backdrop, the 2nd Africa Food Security and Adaptation conference (AFSAC2) is slated to take place on July 30-31, 2015 with theme: Africa’s Soil the New Frontier: Re-imagining Africa Food Security Now and into the Future Under a Changing Climate. See the website to register for the conference.

In 2013 the first conference outcomes and declaration gave impetus and made the case for Ecosystem based Adaptation (EBA) for Food security as an approaches that can address both food security and adaptation to climate change and currently the African Union Commission has considered EBA among priority mechanisms not only to building resilience to climate change related shocks and enhance agricultural productivity for better food security but also promoting sustainable land use and land management as it is explicitly stated in Pillar I of CAADP.

The key objectives of the conference are:

• To identify scalable and inclusive business models for EBA driven agriculture that can create opportunities in the entire agricultural value chain 
• To identify scalable innovative financing models for EBA driven agriculture that when implemented could stimulate growth, job creation and value chain partnership in Africa 
• To understand the benefits of EBA for job creation and the achievement of the proposed SDGs and what Africa will lose as a continent if EbA is ignored or given little support; 
• To identify enabling policies and legislation that will incentivize countries to invest in agriculture, soil conservation and EbA; 
• To discuss what needs to be done to incentivize private sector involvement in EBA-driven agriculture to bring in capital and enhance competitiveness. 

The conference will link the outcomes and declaration from the 1st conference and the EbA mapping that were conducted by the continental task force team. AFSAC2 outcomes will help in accelerating the implementation of the Malabo declaration on agriculture and food security as well as contribute to the Agenda 2063.