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The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has emerged as an exogenous shock to global food supply chains, which foreshadows worrying impacts on Africa's food security and nutrition, and threaten to derail national and global efforts to end hunger and poverty and to achieve sustainable development goals on the continent. This article provides an early assessment of the implications of the invasion for Africa's food supply chains and food security. Two particularly aggravating factors, which explain the current and likely future impact of the invasion on Africa's food security are discussed: the timing of the invasion and the two parties involved in the conflict. The article underlines four major channels by which the invasion disrupts African food supply chains: energy markets and shipping routes, availability and prices of agricultural production inputs, domestic food price inflation, and trade sanctions and other financial measures. In addition, the article considers the risk of social and political unrest that disruption to food supply chains and spikes in domestic food prices may inflame. Finally, the paper briefly discusses options for short- and long-term responses by African governments and their development partners to mitigate the repercussions of the conflict on food supply chains, boost food and nutrition security, and build resilience of Africa's food systems. Keywords: Food Security, Food Supply Chain, Food System, Russia-Ukraine Conflict, Africa.., 1. Introduction Contemporary food systems are increasingly globalised, constituting complex networks of multiple actors and multidirectional interlinkages between organisations at local, national, regional and global levels. Food systems are composed [...]

In the context of Uganda, this study delves into gender-based strategies aimed at enhancing women's engagement in milk safety, value addition, and marketing within smallholder livestock farming. The objectives were two-fold: first, to document the current practices of women in milk safety, value addition, and marketing channels; second, to examine the constraints, opportunities, and strategies related to the production of safe milk and milk products, along with accessing sustainable markets. Conducted in four sub-counties of the Kiruhura district, this research employed both qualitative participatory methods and structured questionnaires, including 12 focused group discussions and 20 key informant interviews with both women and men. Notably, 217 structured questionnaires were administered. The findings illuminate that women played a central role in milk processing, water provisioning, sanitation, and hygiene practices and were the primary contributors to milk value addition, particularly in the production of butter and ghee. Despite their active involvement, women face challenges in accessing adequate milk quantities, employ traditional labor-intensive procedures, and encounter difficulties in marketing their processed products. Men, often the household heads, held decision-making authority over milk consumption and controlled the selling of milk, contributing to gender disparities. Addressing these challenges necessitates comprehensive support, including training and capacity-building initiatives for both men and women in milk value addition, credit access, and market entry. The study underscores the potential for improved women's access to milk quantities, particularly for butter and ghee production, to strengthen rural livelihoods and boost dairy production in Uganda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The expected growth of China's cotton imports along with Egypt's quest for penetrating new cotton importing markets have together attracted the authors to investigate the competitiveness and the demand for Egyptian cotton in the Chinese market in order to capture the emerging opportunities that Egypt could gain from such a growing market. The paper aims to discuss these issues Design/methodology/approach – The paper employs Balassa's index of revealed comparative advantage and Vollrath's indices of revealed competitive advantage in order to measure the competitiveness of Egyptian cotton exports. An Almost Ideal Demand System (AIDS) approach was then used to estimate demand parameters for Chinese cotton imports from Egypt and major supply sources during the period 1992-2011. Findings – Results show that Egypt has experienced dramatic declines in its cotton comparative advantage over the analyzed period. The estimation results of the AIDS model indicate that Egypt's market share is positively affected by both own and US export prices, but negatively influenced by export prices of other competitors in the Chinese market. Results also indicate that Egyptian cotton is substitutable for cotton imports from all other regions, especially for US cotton. Moreover, additional Chinese expenditure on cotton imports would favor other suppliers. Finally, demand for Egyptian cotton was found to be more sensitive to price changes and there is a greater tendency for China to switch to Egyptian cotton than the other way around should relative prices change. Originality/value – This paper is original and novel in that; despite numerous studies have been done on China's demand for cotton and the several studies have been carried out on export and marketing of Egypt's cotton, the issue of cotton trade between Egypt and China has rarely been empirically examined. Furthermore, our results update important parameter estimates, particularly import demand elasticities of cotton. For Egypt, the study provides useful policy implications that could help policy makers to improve informed decision making with regard topromoting cotton exports to the Chinese market. For China, the study helps understanding the interrelationship between the Chinese cotton market and other emerging exporting markets, while focusing on the Egyptian market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyzed specialist small- and medium-sized agricultural export firms in Egypt in order to identify perceived opportunities and barriers regarding present and future export activities. The results indicate that these firms have to deal with stiff foreign competition in terms of price and quality criteria, while lacking relevant knowledge and information on how to deal with these challenges. The firms that perceived most future opportunities from exports were identified as using e.g. digital information sources and were able to source products from exportcommitted domestic farmers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]