Uganda Agricultural Market Systems Workshop Summary Report

Abstract

From the workshop, USAID and its partners have produced seven actionable outputs that will inform investments and partnership opportunities moving forward: 1. A revised set of Uganda’s Agricultural Market Systems map was created, represented by ten subsystems: agro-processing, financial and business services; Production, Post-Harvest Handling and Storage; Human Resources; Inputs Importing & Manufacturing; Input Distribution; Farmer Practices; Commodity Distribution; Regulatory Environment; and Extension Services (Annex 1Uganda’s Agricultural Market Systems Overview Map). 2. Individual participant organizations identified the needed behaviors, ideal relationships and necessary conditions they believed were most important to drive change in the system. This is represented in the Behaviors, Relationships, and Conditions findings found in Annex 2. 3. Data knowns and unknowns were identified by individual participants to catalogue what is already out there and what still needs to be analyzed and commissioned for research (Annex 3Data). 4. All 168 participants “placed” themselves in Uganda’s agricultural market system, through the mapping exercise. This gives all participants a view into what actors are connected to them, both in the room and in the larger marketplace, what behaviors exhibited by what actors exert an influence on them, and what other actors and parts of the system they influence themselves. 5. Having identified areas for intervention and investment through the mapping exercises, a list of participant-identified “Opportunities and Challenges” was created by thematic area (Annex 5Opportunities and Challenges). Narratives supporting the conversations had around opportunities and challenges in these various thematic areas are also included in Annex 6 Narrative Summaries of Thematic Areas Opportunities and Challenges. 6. A participant vote tally on the relative importance of each thematic area. While not providing data to quantify the actual importance or weight of each area, this tally does provide a useful stock-taking or “temperature check” on how to prioritize investments, at least according to the 168 participants in the workshop (Annex 7 Thematic Areas with Participant Votes). 7. A reflection by workshop participants on what different kinds of actors need to start and stop doing to drive systemic change. Again, while not providing an analytically rigorous assessment of what actually needs to happen, this exercise provides a useful view into actor’s perspectives of other actors that they relate to the system (Annex 8 Start and Stop Exercise).In seeking to better understand Uganda’s agricultural market systems, working with partners to co-design programs which address bottlenecks, seize opportunities, and achieve systemic change, in support of the Government of Uganda’s Second National Development Plan, USAID hosted a three-day workshop March 15 - 17th, 2017 where 168 participants and presenters explored a market systems approach and developed a pipeline of actionable opportunities and challenges to inform future programming.USAI