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NEPAD CEO Dr Mayaki and Brazil鈥檚 Ambassador to South Africa Mr P L Carneiro De Mendon莽a met today at the Agency鈥檚 offices in Midrand, to develop a joint food and nutrition security programme in Africa called PAA Africa NEPAD, which stands for Programa de Aquisi莽茫o de Alimentos or the Food Purchase Programme

PAA Africa NEPAD is inspired by a similar initiative in Brazil鈥檚, created in 2003 under the Zero Hunger Programme. It promotes access to food by supporting family farming. The programme purchases a wide variety of food produced by the farmers without a bidding process. The food is then distributed to people in food and nutrition insecurity communities as well as to those served by social assistance networks. PAA Africa is currently carried out in five small-scale projects with a focus on rural Africa in Sub-Saharan countries, namely Ethiopia, Malawi, Mozambique, Niger and Senegal. 听

The meeting today explored areas of cooperation and to identify concrete African projects that will benefit from PAA Africa NEPAD. Ambassador Carneiro De Mendon莽a shared the experience of Brazil鈥檚 school feeding programme, which has improved the lives of more than 14 million school children in the country. The lessons learned from Brazil will inform NEPAD鈥檚 school feeding programme being implemented in 12 African countries together with other partners.

Dr Mayaki said that improving food security is crucial because it has the most significant impact in changing the lives of the people in rural communities. He stressed the need for better institutional coordination to ensure that food and nutrition security interventions are well-planned, budgeted for and implemented at national and regional levels.

PAA Africa NEPAD will be promoted and implemented within the framework of the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP).

They also discussed ways of scaling up bioenergy development so as to accelerate agricultural growth in Africa.