Welcoming the new YPARD South Africa representative - Obert Mathivha

YPARD is welcoming OBERT MATHIVHA as YPARD South Africa representative.

Obert Mathivha grew up in rural areas of South Africa where agricultural activities became part of his upbringing and constituted about 90 percent of his household survival and income.

Today, Obert is a legal and diplomatic graduate from the University of Pretoria while his  inherent passion for agriculture made him to defy all odds and went on to continue being a farmer and become an outstanding agripreneur. He particularly focuses on Youth Development, focusing on agri-business sector.

Obert is Managing Director of a regional-based Commercial Agricultural Youth Chamber (CAYC) based in South Africa. He is a hands-on specialist on Agricultural Research and Policy Formulations, Strategy and Programme Design (Farm-based Business Development Services) and Project Management. He has been prominently engaged in these areas both at National, Continental and Global levels.

His major contribution includes among others:

• The Creation of a Database of both aspirant & existing agricultural graduates, entrepreneurs, farmers, agricultural stakeholders, development institutions, researchers & development agencies locally & internationally;
• Facilitating the development of National Youth Enterprise Strategy (YES);
• Regional Agri-Youth Policy Studies in 6 SADC countries on behalf of FANRPAN-CTA. Check the FANRPAN country case studies by the 6 young consultants!
• Spearheading the development of Youth Entrepreneurship Campaign 2010 in South Africa (YEC 2010); Co-led the development of National Youth Policy 2009-2014; Spearheaded the development of Integrated Youth Development Strategy of South Africa, June 2011; Developed Ministry of Agricultural Agro-Processing Strategy 2008;

He is currently particularly working on:

• Conducting a research on possible youth targets in the post-2014 MGDs on behalf of European Report on Development (ERD)
• Contributing to designing an appropriate Africa-wide agriyouth development tool aligned Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development (CAADP), other relevant binding policy frameworks/declarations and emerging global trends

Obert brings a wealth of experience in the YPARD Family on areas of youth mobilisation, lobby and advocacy, public-private partnerships, and is so happy to have found a credible companion to accomplish his active dream: that of creating a new layer of AgriYouth Innovative Generation capable of exploiting untapped agri-business opportunities across African agricultural value chain.

We enthusiasticaly welcome Obert on board! There is no doubt that with such a strong background and enthusiasm, Obert will lead successfully YPARD SA activities!

We warmly thank Shakespear Mudombi, former YPARD South Africa representative, for his strong commitment to YPARD. We wish him all the very best in all his endeavors; we do know we will remain in touch and we look forward carrying on working together.

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