Partners in the Sahel moving towards a common roadmap on resilience

By the stakeholders of the AGIR Alliance

Following a series of consultations between Sahelian and West African countries, West African regional organisations, organisations of agricultural producers and pastoralists, the private sector, the civil society, financial partners and non-governmental organisations, stakeholders involved in food and nutritional security met in Ouagadougou on 6 December 2012 within the framework of the Food Crisis Prevention Network (RPCA) to seal the Global Alliance for Resilience Initiative - Sahel and West Africa.

Mère et Enfant. CRÉDIT: ECHO

Stakeholders agreed to define resilience as the capacity of vulnerable households, families and systems to face uncertainty and the risk of shocks, to withstand and respond effectively to shocks, as well as to recover and adapt in a sustainable manner.

The general objective set by the stakeholders is to: Structurally and sustainably reduce food and nutritional vulnerability by supporting the implementation of Sahelian and West African policies.

The Alliance aims to achieve ‘Zero Hunger’, eliminating hunger and malnutrition, within the next 20 years. A roadmap, based on the Ouagadoubou declaration and scheduled for 2013, will provide quantitative specific objectives and monitoring indicators.


To achieve this goal, the Alliance agrees to focus efforts on the following groups of households:

• Small-scale farmers with limited market access, insecure land tenure, and little capital to invest in agriculture, who are thus not producing enough food to feed themselves and have few opportunities for income diversification. This group includes a large number of landless rural residents.

• Agro-pastoralists and pastoralists whose capital stock and livelihoods are continually threatened by recurring weather hazards.

• Poor agricultural and non-agricultural workers in urban and rural areas.

A particular focus will be placed on the most vulnerable groups, including under-five children, and more particularly those under two-year of age, as well as pregnant women and breastfeeding mothers. A specific effort will target women in light of their predominant role in food production, income generation, education, health and child nutrition.

See full Ouagadougou Joint Statement