The second cohort of Kenya food systems practitioners have now been admitted into the African Food Fellowship. The Fellowship held a launch ceremony on Nov 14 2022 for the 40 new Fellows, kicking off their leadership journey which will start with the Food Systems Leadership Programme.
They were welcomed into the Fellowship by Kenya Dean Brenda Mareri, who stressed the importance of collaboration in order to achieve transformative change. “Transforming food systems is a collective and individual endeavour, and we can not work alone to realize systemic change. The African food fellowship provides the space to meet like minded peers and open up avenues of collaboration. We are excited to see the Fellowship grow with this new class and we look forward to supporting them on their journey,” she said.
The Fellows will spend the next 10 months in the leadership programme, where they will enjoy training from food systems experts from Wageningen University & Research and Wasafiri Consulting, as well as interact with industry leaders and technical mentors. They will gain a firm theoretical foundation and understanding of food systems, and create workable, scalable solutions towards building transformative food systems. Afterwards, they will graduate and join Cohort One as fully fledged members of the Kenya Food Fellowship.
“I believe we have a fragmented food system in Kenya and Africa, we need to think about initiatives that can bring together ecosystem towards sustainability and making food systems work,” said Eunice Mutua, an incoming Horticulture Fellow. On his part, Cohort One Agrifinance Fellow Sieka Gatabaki assured the new Fellows that they were in the right place to develop the skills and capacity that will take them to the next level as food systems practitioners and leaders.
“The African Food Fellowship helped me define problems and identify interventions that address the broader contexts of issues. The Food Systems leadership program broadened my way of thinking using the Systems change assessing the levers of change and how they are interconnected,” said Sieka, who is also the Program Director for Mercy Corps Agrifin.
Here are the 40 new Fellows per their impact areas:
