NRF participates in the launch of CEA- FIRST, a Horizon Europe Coordination Support Action (CSA), in Ghana, 12-14 February 2024.

On 12-14 February 2024, the NRF’s Acting Executive Director, Dr Prudence Makhura, and Ms Nombuso Madonda (Professional Officer) participated in the CEA-FIRST Inception Meeting hosted by the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) in Tema, Ghana. The CEA-FIRST Inception Meeting is held back-to-back with the International Research Consortium (IRC) Signatories’ Meeting and the first CEA-FIRST General Assembly.

Under the Horizon Europe financing framework, the International Research Consortium (IRC) will be operationalised through a Coordination Support Action titled Consortium Europe-Africa on Research and Innovation for Food Systems Transformation (CEA-FIRST) within the EU Farm-to-Fork strategy. CEA-FIRST, which formerly started on 01 December 2023, aims to:

• Provide public access to an extensive knowledge platform on FNSSA;
• Offer a sound method for analysis of R&I activities and priorities;
• Support the updating of the Roadmap for the AU-EU R&I partnership on FNSSA;
• Establish operational and thematic research Working Groups; and
• Support the liaison between the IRC with the AU-EU High-Level Policy Dialogue (HLPD).

The NRF is a partner in the CEA-FIRST project and co-leads Task 3.3. with CIHEAM-IAMB (Italy) on clustering activities for defining operational funders’ working groups for the support of the FNSSA Roadmap implementation with new R&I priorities and Task 5.2 with CIRAD (France) on the initiation of the R&I programming for IRC.

The IRC was launched in 2022 as a sustainable AU-EU Platform for research and innovation in Food and Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture (FNSSA). In the context of transitions in the agri-food systems, climate change, population growth and other related drivers of economic development, the IRC is seen as a formidable lever for building an equitable and sustainable research and innovation partnership between Africa and Europe.

For more information on CEA-FIRST and to indicate interest in joining the IRC Platform, please contact Nombuso Madonda at NP.Madonda@risa.nrf.ac.za