Green Cameroon on the Farmer Innovation Fair In Cameroon (FIPAC)
Green Cameroon in partnership with the Ministry of Scientific Research and Innovation organized a FIPAC Projects Evaluation Day on Friday the 19th 
of March 2021. The event took place in the Conference Hall of the Regional Delegation of the Ministry of Scientific Research and Innovation for the South West. It was meant to enable all candidates from the South West, who submitted innovative projects towards the fair, to present their project ideas to the selection panel.
Green Cameroon is working in partnership with the Prolinnova Cameroon network towards organizing a Farmer Innovation Fair in Cameroon (FIPAC). The aim of the fair is to promote local innovation processes by identifying farmer innovations and engaging in farmer led joint research. Local innovation in this context is seen as the process of developing locally new and better ways of doing things. This can be in terms of technology, organisation of socio-economic institutions, new marketing procedures, local financing, or changes in gender roles/ responsibilities.
The nationwide Farmer innovation fair will be organized at the national level, bringing together selected innovations from all ten regions to compete for prizes and recognition. It will also serve as an opportunity to showcase famer’s creativity and a tool for advocacy and lobbying to open doors that inhibit the ability of farmers towards seeking solution to their problems. It shall also be an avenue for networking and other forms of exchanges. Selected innovations shall be presented in Yaounde where the national fair shall take place with the organizers taking charge of all the innovators logistics.
All Cameroonians farmers who have developed their own local innovations in the fields of crop farming, horticulture, livestock husbandry, agroforestry, fishery, storage and processing of plant and animal products, biodiversity conservation and climate change adaptation in agro-ecological
production will be able to show their initiatives to the world. The farmers may be gardeners, small-scale crop farmers, agropastoralists or pastoralists as well as people who have innovated in the agro-sylvo-pastoral and fisheries sectors, including urban farmers.
The innovations can be technical, organisational, institutional or social.
It was therefore in preparation for this Fair scheduled to hold from the 27th to the 29th May 2021 in Yaounde that the event was organized. As the innovators from all over the region presented their projects, the jury was saddled with the responsibility of selecting the Best five projects that will represent the South West Region at the National Fair in Yaounde.
The Selection panel included the Director of Green Cameroon H. M. Chief Masango Sone and was headed by Dr. George Mafany, Regional Delegate of the Ministry of Scientific Research and Innovation who also used the opportunity to school the candidates on the importance and various procedures for copyright protection of their innovations. He also laid emphasis on the respect of social distance and other recommended Covid 19 prevention measures.
A total of 12 innovations were presented from the South West Region ranging from an automatic seed sowing machine to an automatic plantain peeling machine, all invented by young Cameroonian Innovators. The event left all those present with a feeling of satisfaction as it was clear that there are young Cameroonians in our communities who are doing wonderful things to develop and advance the agricultural sector in Cameroon.
