CTA annual seminar 2009 / “The role of the Media in the Agricultural and Rural Development of ACP Countries” / Brussels declaration
BRUSSELS, Kingdom of Belgium, October 27, 2009/African Press Organization (APO)/ — The theme of this year’s annual international seminar of the ACP-EU Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA), which was held in Brussels, Belgium, from 12 to 16 October 2009 was “The Role of the Media in the Agricultural and Rural Development of ACP Countries”.
Reiterating the vital role that Agriculture plays in the development of ACP States, the seminar stressed the fact that in these countries, more than 2/3 of the poor still live in rural areas and are heavily dependent on agriculture for their livelihoods.
The seminar made the somewhat painful observation that whereas, on the one hand, the agricultural sector in general, and the rural populations are not featured sufficiently in the ACP media, on the other, the information conveyed to them does not always meet their expectations.
The seminar therefore highlighted the important role of the media in the removal of all types of obstacles to innovation, increasing the productivity of the agricultural sector and farmers, whether large or small holdings, and whether they are growing crops mainly for personal consumption or are involved in commercial farming.
In the light of this, the seminar makes the following recommendations:
General :
The treatment of issues relating to agricultural and rural development, whatever the medium used, must serve local interests which, from now on, will serve as a gauge for validating political orientations, techniques, and technologies;
Greater effort must be made by the media, as well as by all the other actors in agricultural and rural development in ACP countries, so as to capitalize on the different types of knowledge, know-how, expertise and experiences available;
To the media :
Devote the necessary attention to Agriculture and the changes taking place in the rural sector by learning to understand the policies and innovations at work in agricultural and rural development; showcase the achievements, difficulties, concerns and aspirations, as well as the successes of the agricultural and rural sector; and provide useful information for the ACP agricultural sector, so as to enable it, while increasing its productivity and products, to reduce its harmful effects on the environment ;
Consider the experience of local farmers as an important component of agricultural and economic information and, consequently, give a voice to the local actors, i.e. the agricultural farmers, to enable them to speak, share their experiences and derive mutual benefit from their knowledge;
Make the development of agricultural information a part of their long-term strategies by promoting the specialisation and ongoing capacity-building of their teams;
Agricultural operators :
Become aware of their status as actors in the validation of all policies, techniques and/or technologies, as well as their correlative quality as producers and generators of information, and consequently open up to sharing their experiences via the media;
Create the conditions necessary to maximise, disseminate and exchange all forms of knowledge and know-how that they possess;
Researchers, Scientists & Academics:
Channel their efforts, on the one hand, towards satisfying the needs and meeting the expectations of the agricultural sector in general, and of the agricultural producers in particular and, on the other, the capitalisation of traditional knowledge;
Convey in a language accessible to the widest audience possible, the results of their work on agricultural and rural development;
States & Regional Organisations:
Truly make agricultural and rural development one of the fundamental aims of the strategies, policies and other national and regional development plans of ACP States;
Promote the active and meaningful involvement of the media and various stakeholders in agricultural and rural development, at all the relevant levels of the policy development cycle;
Create the endogenous institutional, organic and material conditions for the development of the media and their understanding of the issues linked to agricultural and rural development in ACP countries;
Community of partners in the development of ACP countries and the private sector:
Maintain agricultural and rural development in ACP countries as a priority on the international agenda and therefore act within the framework of their various interventions;
Work towards strengthening the sector for agricultural and rural development in ACP countries.
Having concluded that failure to perceive Agriculture as a priority sector that warrants the full attention of governments, as well as the different types of development partners, is one of the fundamental reasons for the minimal interest with which the media has long treated agricultural and rural development in ACP countries, the Seminar therefore urges:
The Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation ACP-EU (CTA) :
To widely publicise the recommendations of this seminar to the Authorities and stakeholders in the ACP countries;
To incorporate into its plan of action for the coming years, as far as possible, those recommendations which fall within its remit;
Create conditions for the follow-up and assessment of the impact of this Seminar.
In the short term, it makes the following recommendations:
Promote mechanisms for sharing experiences and information and pooling knowledge;
Build the intellectual, material and technical capacities of the different media groups;
Establish synergies among the different media groups and productive partnerships between the various groups of actors in agricultural and rural development in the ACP countries;
Adjust the capacity-building systems to ensure that they fully adapted to the challenges of the interaction between the Media with Agriculture.
SOURCE
Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation ACP-EU (CTA)
