A TWO-day workshop in Bujumbura has been told of the serious threat that aflatoxin contamination poses to citizens of East Africa. The main objective of the inception workshop held in the Burundian capital was to introduce to key stakeholders the components and implementation arrangements of the EAC Regional Project on Aflatoxins and to constitute the EAC Regional Experts Working Group on Aflatoxins (REWGA).

Opening the workshop over the weekend, Burundi's Minister for Agriculture Odette Kayitesi said the project was expected to tremendously contribute to food security and safety through aflatoxin control and prevention in the region. In a speech read on his behalf by the country's Assistant Minister for Agriculture Boniface Mwikomo, Kayitesi reiterated the need to pay attention to public awareness creation, capacity building, research and development as well as setting appropriate standards and regulations to ensure that products comply with both regional and international market requirements.

"We should not hesitate to support the transfer and uptake of promising technologies that will help mitigate the adverse impacts of aflatoxin at various levels in our region," he said. The EAC Deputy Secretary General in charge of Productive and Social Sectors, Jesca Eriyo, said that the EAC Secretariat and Partner States had developed a number of instruments aimed at increasing the supply of value added exportable products and improved market access. Eriyo, who was represented by the EAC Principal Agricultural Economist Moses Marwa, informed the workshop that one of the recent outstanding developments in the region was the adoption of the Protocol on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures by the EAC Council of Ministers.

She said that the protocol will contribute towards rational development of the agricultural sector and increase quality production to ensure food security and safety and free trade in agricultural products in the EAC and other trading partners. "I want to emphasize that the EAC Secretariat has prioritized the control and prevention of aflatoxin and we take cognizance of the unprecedented threat aflatoxin poses to health, trade and food security in the region," she said. Aflatoxins are toxic substances produced by fungal species during their growth under favourable conditions of temperature and moisture. Aflatoxins pose adverse health and economic effects along the food production and supply value chain. In particular, Aflatoxins undermine efforts to improve nutrition and enhance agricultural production. They minimize economic gains from agricultural products, especially for small scale farmers.

The main cereals affected are maize, sorghum, rice and wheat and other crops like groundnuts and cassava. Aflatoxin causes liver cancer, suppresses the immune system, and retards the growth and development of children. Aflatoxins have been associated with various diseases in livestock such as aflatoxicosis. Aflatoxin-contaminated feed and food causes a decrease in productivity in humans and animals and is sometimes fatal. Aflatoxin-contaminated agricultural products have a relatively low market value and are sometimes destroyed depending on the levels of contamination.

Aflatoxin contamination is not adequately and appropriately controlled or regulated within the EAC region as most foodstuffs are produced and consumed locally with limited or no testing by the relevant regulatory authorities. As a result, millions of people in East Africa consume high, unsafe levels of aflatoxin through their diets on a daily basis. The EAC Secretariat is spearheading implementation of a regional project aimed at preventing and controlling adverse impacts of Aflatoxin along the food and feed value chains in the EAC region. The Multi-Regional Aflatoxin Abatement Project (MRAAP) is implemented by EAC with financial support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Regional Office for East Africa. The main expected output from the project will be an overarching EAC Regional Policy on Aflatoxins abatement.

The EAC Secretariat is working closely with the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) as a collaborating partner responsible for technical backstopping. Keynote speakers at the workshop included Dr Charity Mutegi of IITA, who spoke on, "Impacts of Aflatoxins on Food Security and Bio-control Interventions." She was represented by Dr Maina Wagacha, a plant pathologist at IITA. Other presentations focused on areas such as the health and economic impacts of aflatoxin, as well as collaborative partnerships across Africa and country reports.