About Us

NANTS is the Managing Partner of the Voices for Food Security – a Consortium composed of about 50 organizations working on different aspects of agric interventions in Nigeria. NANTS is also the Secretariat of the Pan African NGO Consortium on Agriculture – PANGOC, as well as the Secretariat of the Non-State Actors Coalition on CAADP in Nigeria – the continental NSAs body on CAADP.

At the regional Economic Community (RECs) and African continental level, NANTS works with organizations such FARA, IFPRI, the AUC, UNECA while also relating with PAEPARD, WTO as well as SON, NAFDAC, CBN, etc at the national level. Such collaboration and partnership gears towards public-private sector supportive actions to energize FDI, product quality and standards, market access, access to finance, result-oriented advocacy, etc.

In addition to NANTS’ core principles and values, there are a number of cross-cutting issues that are considered in every engagement of the Association. These include:

i.Ensuring that the outcomes will be pro-poor,

ii.Promotion of gender equity and sensitivity to HIV and AIDS issues, and

iii.Contribute to ensuring environmental sustainability.

 NANTS will always address these cross-cutting issues by:

i.Strictly adhering to the FAAP principles during the formulation of operational and work plans for its Strategic Priorities, initiatives and projects

ii.Developing innovation platforms that incorporate stakeholders with direct interest, knowledge and skills in these issues

iii.Targeting sensitisation and support to stakeholders through capacity-strengthening initiatives on cross-cutting issues Using monitoring and evaluation criteria that ensure compliance with both NANTS’ core principles and the manner in which cross-cutting issues are address.

NANTS gender approach in this strategy is an integral component of this overall strategy. NANTS recognises that a focus on gender can increase the productivity of agriculture and improve food security and nutrition. Improving women’s access to productive resources to be at par with men will increase farm yields by 20-30%. This will in turn increase agricultural output in developing countries by 2.5 – 4%, thereby reducing the number of hungry people by 12-17% (FAO 2011).

This strategy’s gender-mainstreaming approach promotes the integration of the needs of both men and women equally into its programmes and operations. Central to this is the promotion of policies and actions that facilitate equitable access to productive resources by both men and women, as well as the integration of gender perspectives into NANTS functions and activities to ensure that both sexes benefit. Women’s needs will be accounted for in the development and dissemination of trade and agricultural policies and technologies. Women will be enabled to 11 fully participate in and benefit from agricultural innovation processes, and women farmers, agribusiness persons and scientists will receive the training they need to be fully competitive in their work. Added to this is that issues around youth will be taken very seriously within the target and objective of ensuring youthful replacement of aging farmers as well as creation of employment for younger generation and teeming youths in order to avoid insecurity consequences of joblessness.

The process of developing this strategy has been informed by the following documents:

i The Frame work for African Agricultural Productivity (FAAP)

ii Gender Equality and African Regional Institutions (GEARI) gender audit report of 2009 CAADP

iii Pillar Strategy and operational Plan 2011 -2013

 iv The draft MTOP 2014–2018 as well as the draft report on constraints and opportunities for mainstreaming gender in African agricultural research and development among others.