ADDIS ABABA – July 05, 2024 (NIPN) - Coordinator of the National Information Platforms for Nutrition-Ethiopia (NIPN-Ethiopia) provided an over view of the objectives and activities undertaken by NIPN-Ethiopia in partnership with various stakeholders over the past years. Dr. Aregash Samuel seized the opportunity to highlight the work of NIPN-Ethiopia at a Steering Committee meeting of the Promotion of Agricultural Productivity Program (PAPP) held here last Tuesday, July 2, 2024. Sources indicated that the program is being implemented by GIZ Ethiopia, KfW, Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt, PTB, and DBFZ Deutsches Biomasseforschungszentrum gemeinnützige GmbH on behalf of the German Government. The opening remarks for this event were delivered by the GIZ Country Director for Ethiopia and Djibouti, as well as the representative of the State Minister of the Ministry of Agriculture.
Dr Aregash indicated in her briefing on the occasion that NIPN-Ethiopia prepared high impact outputs in nutrition, agriculture, school feeding, fortification, and others. She has also touched on the impact of the expansion phase and the potential impact of the scale-up phase on child stunting and mortality through a project named Seqota Declaration. The NIPN-Ethiopia Coordinator briefed about the scoping review of the effects of school feeding on educational and nutritional outcomes in Ethiopia. Experience of NIPN-Ethiopia uptake of policy inputs by nutrition policy makers in Ethiopia, a report on key findings on current challenges and opportunities of biofortification, the National Food and Nutrition Strategy Baseline Survey, the high-level training provided to 293 participants on STATA, meta-analysis and gender, nutrition dashboards and data repositories for easy utilization of nutrition data were among the flagship initiatives stated by the coordinator.
Dr Aregash has also mentioned the challenges NIPN-Ethiopia has faced during project implementation period. Delay in the policy question formulation process due to the restructuring of the government systems, delays in the procurement process and financial settlement were mentioned, among other things, as major challenges.
With regard to the 2024 flagship activities of NIPN-Ethiopia, the coordinator mentioned the cascading initiatives, finalizing the policy question formulation, metadata preparation and integration with the National Data Management Centre in the Ethiopian Public Health Institute and wrapping up of the sustainability plan.
A news release from GIZ reflects that, various speakers took the podium to discuss activities carried out in partnership with GIZ Ethiopia and Djibouti, KfW, Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt, PTB, and DBFZ Deutsches Biomasseforschungszentrum gemeinnützige GmbH on behalf of the German Government.
Prof. Ali Mohammed, advisor to the state minister for agriculture and horticulture, opened the event on behalf of the state minister, emphasizing the need for program updates and gathering stakeholder inputs. Dorothee Hutter, GIZ Ethiopia and Djibouti Country Director, highlighted the 60-year Ethio-German partnership and the role agriculture played while Axel Wildner, Counsellor for Food and Agriculture at the German Embassy in Ethiopia, urged all actors to focus on developing both local and export markets.
The program manager Andrea Wilhelmi shared achievements of a 76% increase in gross margin for farmers, improved conditions for 7,669 employees, training for 352,150 individuals, 4,858 jobs created, and a 30% turnover increase for 112 MSMEs.
The meeting included presentations and a Q&A panel. Ambassador Deriba Kuma, Director General of the Ethiopian Agriculture Authority, closed the event by acknowledging the progress and future collaboration. (NIPN)
