The vast majority of the 150,000 young Beninese who enter the labour market each year, although skilled, do not meet the market’s needs, worsening the already high underemployment and unemployment rate of this age group (over 50 percent). The national employment landscape is also marked by a limited entrepreneurial spirit among the youth, most of whom hope for salaried jobs.

The Beninese agricultural sector can be a lever for structural transformation by providing jobs and is a sector in which well-performing businesses can thrive. However, the country’s agricultural potential remains stifled by limited access to land, finance and markets for young people, women and small producers. Several initiatives to promote agricultural entrepreneurship have been implemented in Benin, but most have focused on the training component.

The Benin Agribusiness Development Project (PDAB) is implemented by a coordination team (a coordinator and a monitoring specialist) under the Directorate of the Agricultural Council, Innovation and Entrepreneurial Training of the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries and supported by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the Government of Benin and the Government of India. 

The PDAB aims to alleviate the problem of youth and women’s employment in Benin by enhancing the country’s agricultural potential through the development of viable agricultural entrepreneurship, oriented to the promotion of value chains. The project contributes to reduction of underemployment and unemployment through professionalization and enhancement of the competitiveness of young and women entrepreneurs, small producers and small and medium-sized enterprises that supply, distribute and process local agricultural products. The project offers thematic training, advice, facilitates access to information on the agricultural market and to factors of production (especially land and financing) and promotes standards and quality. 

The PDAB fosters networking and the capitalization of synergies between small producers, young entrepreneurs and other entities that integrate agricultural product processing value chains. Implementation of the project relies on the expertise of various stakeholders in supporting small and medium-sized enterprises from business formalization to bank financing. The Project Management Unit coordinates the interventions of stakeholders for enhanced public-private collaborations. A mechanism for business profitability and loan repayment has been established. 

The project aims to improve beneficiary access to agricultural product markets. In doing so, the incomes of young and women small and medium-sized agricultural enterprises should increase, with a ripple effect on other young job seekers and small producers. Ultimately the attractiveness of agriculture and rural areas should be strengthened, mitigating rural exodus. 

Project beneficiaries are selected through calls for expression of interest open to entrepreneurs between 18 and 40 years old who are working in the agro-food sector, primarily in targeted high-added-value sub-sectors (rice, corn, soybeans, cassava, market gardening, fish farming, poultry farming and dairy).

South-South cooperation with India facilitated the mobilization of the India-UN Development Partnership Fund to support incubation services to 101 young agribusiness startups. The project is financed by the Benin Government ($8 million: 95 percent), UNDP ($300,000: 3.5 percent) and the India-UN Fund ($150,000: 1.5 percent). The project envisages future South-South sharing of experiences with other countries (especially in Africa and Latin America) that are investing in their agricultural potential and promoting youth and women entrepreneurship and employment in the agribusiness sector. 

Achievements of the project so far are:

• 1,000 entrepreneurs of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the agro-food sector have been selected, trained and affiliated with networks to promote their agribusiness activities;
• 411 entrepreneurs have been supported to develop agribusiness plans and a financial statement and have been trained on their company’s accounting management tools; and
• 411 entrepreneurs have undergone negotiations with banks to facilitate access to bank loans and finance their agribusiness plans.