Mali Long Term Training and Capacity Building Needs Assessment. Africa Agriculture Capacity Development Training Strategic Technical Assistance for Results with Training (START)

摘要

This report was initiated to address both long and short-term training and capacity building needs for the agricultural sector in Mali, with emphasis on long term training (LTT). It provides recommendations for the United States Agency for International Development's (USAID) intervention for the next 10 to 15 years. Over the past decade, Mali has undergone dramatic economic and political reforms, offering new opportunities for agricultural growth and providing a favorable environment for investment. In implementing the U.S. government's new Initiative to End Hunger in Africa (IEHA), Mali has been chosen as one of the first three African countries to meet this objective. One of IEHA's aims is to strengthen agriculture through investment in training. This new look at USAID strategic involvement is timely, because progress at cutting hunger and poverty in Mali, through long-term training slowed down considerably over the past decade. As a result a gap is being created as most of those trained in the 1960s to 1970s have either retired or are nearing the age of retirement, and no plan was put in place for their replacement. Consequently, this situation calls for an urgent intervention and demands a method of replacement if a gap in technical expertise in Mali is to be avoided in the future.