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AFC together with its partners DLG International, DEULA Nienburg and IAK Leipzig are implementing the Zambian-German Agricultural Knowledge and Training Centre in Zambia since August 2014. The project is financed by the German Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL) under its Bilateral Cooperation Programme and combines technical advice and training from our team of national and international experts on sustainable agricultural production techniques with modern agricultural machinery and inputs provided by twelve German partners from the private sector.
Zambian project partners are the Zambian National Farmers Union (ZNFU) and the Golden Valley Agricultural Research Trust (GART). German project partners are manufactures of agricultural machinery, irrigation equipment, seeds and chemicals (Amazone, Bayer Crop Science, Beinlich, Claas, Europlant, Grimme, Fliegl, Lemken, Pöttinger, Rauch, Riela and Solana). Other German and Zambian private and public partners are expected to join the project in the course of implementation.
The project is located 60 km north of Lusaka on the GART commercial farm Chaloshi, where 72 ha were made available to the project for demonstration and training purposes.
The project was officially launched on the 17th of April 2015 by the German Minister of Agriculture, Christian Schmidt and the Zambian Minister of Agriculture, Hon. Given Lubinda. The official launch of the project followed the opening of the Agritech Expo, currently the largest business platform for the agricultural sector in Zambia, which was also located at the GART premises.
The two ministers together with the ZNFU President, Mrs. Evelyn Nguleka, the German Ambassador to Zambia, Bernd Finke and other GART and ZNFU officials emphasised during their opening speeches the importance of the new project, especially in view of the great demand for qualified staff in the agricultural sector in Zambia and welcomed the initiative of the project to collaborate with national agricultural training institutions and colleges, such as the NRDC (Natural Resources Development College).
This demand was also obvious during the Agritech Expo, where AFC’s project partner, DLG International had organised exhibition stands for the German project partners. Especially the AKTC and the DEULA exhibition stand were highly frequented by farmers, students and training institutions to get information on training activities that will be available through the project.
During a conference for representatives of the five regional African Farmers Organisations, organised by the German Farmers’ Association (DBV) in Lusaka on the 15th and 16th of April, the AKTC team leader, Mr. Helmut Anschuetz was invited to present the project and its concept to interested audiences.
The project team of three long-term experts from Germany, Zambia and Zimbabwe are now preparing for the second growing season for wheat and potato production and the related training and demonstration activities for 2015. Apart from the AKTC resident team, national and international short-term experts and staff from the partner companies will provide training on agricultural machinery handling, operation and maintenance as well as on farm economics and sustainable production techniques and processes.
Press releases:
http://www.bmel.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen/2015/105-Zahl-der-Woche-Sambia.html
For further information on the project, please contact:
Helmut Anschuetz (Team Leader Zambia): helmut.anschuetz [at] afci.de or
Tesa Weiss (Project Coordinator Germany): tesa.weiss [at] afci.de