Africa-Press – Angola. Fifty-three representatives of agricultural cooperatives, academics and business associations participated this Thursday, in this city, in a seminar on the formalization of family farming.
Promoted by the National Institute for Support to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (INAPEM), the training action focused on the new governance paradigm of Agri-PREI, which has the support of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
Agri-PREI aims to strengthen the path towards formalizing agribusiness and informal economic initiatives in agriculture, with greater emphasis on initiatives led by youth and women, introducing integrated primary agricultural production units (Chitaka Agri-PREI) and agro-processing units ( Ochitandas Agri-PREI).
According to PREI’s national coordinator, Paula Coelho, they listened to micro-entrepreneurs in the small-scale family farming and agribusiness sectors, to understand what they think of the Informal Economy Reconversion Program in the agricultural sector.
During the meeting, some actions that can help boost your business were also defined.
“ We brought three themes: Challenges and obstacles faced by small-scale farmers and agro-industry in the process of formalization, Measures to expand the benefits of small-scale farmers and agro-industry and What to do to make formalization in the field of agriculture a success success,” he said.
Paula Coelho made it known that Agri-PREI is being implemented, in this experimental phase, only in the provinces of Luanda and Benguela, and that it is adding value to businesswomen and micro-entrepreneurs who sell in the markets. This initiative should be extended to other provinces in the country.
He explained that, at Benguela level, they already work with a base at the Opongololo cooperative, in the Cavaco area.
“We already have beneficiaries who were trained in entrepreneurship and financial education, as well as learning how to transform their products and, whoever needs it, can go to the Cavaco area. It’s free”, he emphasized.
The results have been encouraging, hence the reason for continuing to develop this project, which focuses on women, but which has also been training some men, he said.
On the occasion, he explained that the project underwent restructuring and, with the lessons learned in the PREI campaigns, they are now working directly with provincial governments and municipal administrations.
“They show us a place to put our containers, which are the PREI stores, and a place to build a future market, to see if we can reduce the number of informal workers in Angola,” he said.
He said that the project expects as results, the awareness of small-scale farmers and agribusiness agents about the steps involved in formalization and the advantages of becoming a legally recognized business.
Identifying necessary measures that can expand the benefits of formalization for small-scale agriculture and small-scale agro-industries, such as access to financial resources, technical assistance and training, are other recommended objectives.
PREI is the Informal Economy Reconversion Program designed by the Government of the Republic of Angola, within the scope of the National Development Plan (PDN) 2018-2022, to promote the transition from the informal economy to the formal economy in the country.
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