CCARDESA ‘s GIZ- ACCRA programme undergoes an Inception Evaluation Mission

The GIZ-Adaptation to climate change in rural areas in Southern Africa (ACCRA) is undergoing a central project inception evaluation mission. The consultants engaged by GIZ to conduct the evaluation are Mr Martin Muchero and Mr Ekkehard Kurschner. The main purpose of this meeting is for evaluators to fully understand in-depth the ACCRA Programme, its key activities, achievements including challenges encountered during the implementation of the Programme. The meeting is both a physical meeting for local staff at Mokolodi in Gaborone and a virtual meeting for the evaluators and other stakeholders.

Ms Hanna Sabass, the ACCRA Programme Manager gave an overview of the ACCRA programme to the evaluators and stakeholders. She mentioned that the ACCRA programme has been supporting CCARDESA since 2016. My project has religiously supported the knowledge, management component of CCARDESA to ensure that CCARDESA maintains its knowledge brokerage mandate in the SADC region of providing agricultural information to enable member states to make data-based decisions, said Ms Sabass. She also informed the evaluators that the ACCRA programme has also supported CCARDESA to conduct climate-proofing, including climate risk analysis of various value chains including livestock, sorghum and maize. This, she continued was mainly done to enable member states to become resilient and be positioned to mitigate and adapt to the effects of climate change. This component also strengthened the capacity of member states in post-harvest losses by conducting rapid loss assessments in member states. The ACCRA programme has also written several investment proposals with some of them finalized. ACCRA has also supported the positioning of CCARDESA to receive financial support through concept note writing and investment proposal formulation.

Ms Sabass also highlighted to the evaluators how ACCRA through its Green Climate Fund (GCF) Readiness programme is supporting the Botswana government under the Ministry of Finance to access funds from the Green Climate Fund. The process which started early last year has included training of stakeholders to ensure that they are aware of the process of preparing to receive the fund to support mitigating impacts and effects of climate change.

At the same function, the ACCRA senior Technical Advisor Mr Nathaniel Mtunji shared with the evaluators the climate-proofing and value chain component of the programme whereas the GCF Readiness technical Advisor Ms., Sepo Sitali also shared the activities implemented with the Botswana government under the GCF readiness programme. In addition, CCARDESA Information& Knowledge Management Officer Mrs Bridget Kakuwa-Kasongamulilo also shared with the evaluators the achievements of the ACCRA programme under the knowledge management component since 2016.

The evaluators thanked the ACCRA team and CCARDESA for the comprehensive presentation which they intimated set the pace for fully understanding the ACCRA Programme.

CCARDESA’s executive director, Dr Cliff Sibusiso Dlamini was also part of the meeting. He said he was happy to be a part of the ACCRA project inception evaluation mission and was thankful for the collaboration and the programme's contribution to the SADC region.

The mission is one of its kind as it is a rare phenomenon to be chosen for evaluation in GIZ. This mission is a preparation for the full evaluation which will take place in 2021. ACCRA has been implementing its activities since 2016 and will come to an end in March 2021.