Namibia vows to use the CCARDESA Website to mitigate the effects of Climate Change

Center for Coordination of Agricultural Research and Development for Southern Africa (CCARDESA) conducted an Information and Communication & Knowledge Management (ICKM) promotion workshop on 26 March 2019 in Windhoek, Namibia.

The main purpose of the workshop was to encourage Namibia Ministry of Agriculture staff, Research Institutions, Universities, NGOs and farmer organizations to engage with CCARDESA’s SAAIKS Knowledge Hub in order to help facilitate agricultural research and development information sharing. Participants were invited to the workshop based on their professional engagement with agricultural research and development, as well as communications in Namibia.

The meeting was officially opened by Mr. Ben Haraseb the Deputy Director in the Directorate of Agricultural Production Extension and Engineering services who stressed that agriculture and fisheries remain critical to the food security and that climatic change is already having dramatic effects on Namibian farmers.  He was happy that the participants were drawn from all sectors of the agriculture and research sector in Namibia and were the right people to populate the website, use it for local farmer benefit and also inform others about the ICKM system.

During the workshop, the Namibia National focal point person for CCARDESA Mrs. Mirjam Taapopi navigated through the CCARDESA website and the Southern Africa Agricultural Information knowledge System (SAAIKS) Knowledge Hub, introducing participants to the site and its functions.

At the end of the workshop, Mr. Vihoroka Kaapehi, the second focal point person for Namibia called the participants to action on how they will use the website. The participants vowed to use the website for their agriculture research, and they also promised to share their research for the benefit of all SADC member states.

In his closing remarks, Mr. Haraseb, intimated the need for the Ministry of Agriculture to use agriculture Public Relation Officers to share information about the CCARDESA website. He further encouraged participants to hasten aquaculture research so that they provide that information to the SAAIKS Knowledge Hub. He was also happy to note that the workshop's objectives were met.

Participants left the workshop invigorated to inform their colleagues and other Namibian stakeholders about the website and its functions.