For several years, sub-regional networks of farmers' organizations and agricultural producers in Southern Africa, Central Africa, East Africa, West Africa and the Maghreb have been working together on issues of continental interest and having a significant impact on African agriculture with the aim of making the voice of African farmers and agricultural producers heard, promoting their involvement in the development and implementation development policies that affect agriculture and rural development at the continental level.
The five sub-regional networks agreed on the founding of the pan-African platform of peasant organizations and agricultural producers. The African Union (AU) supported the process of creating PAFO by agreeing to sponsor the process of organizing the Constitutive General Assembly on the sidelines of the Conference of African Ministers in charge of Agriculture and Rural Development ( CAMA), organized in Lilongwe, Malawi from October 27 to 29, 2010.
At the end of this AGC, the first elected office received the mandate to set up the Executive Secretariat, to make the PAFO functional and operational and to negotiate the partnerships necessary for the life of the organization and the achievement of the objectives. objectives aimed at improving the agricultural sector and the living conditions of agricultural producers and rural people.
The members of PAFO are the five (5) regional organizations of small agricultural producers in Africa, namely:
- EAFF (Eastern African Farmers Federation)
- PROPAC (Regional Platform of Farmers' and Producers' Organizations in Central Africa)
- ROPPA (Network of Farmers' Organizations and Agricultural Producers of West Africa)
- SACAU (Southern African Confederation of Agricultural Unions)
- UMAGRI (Magrebine Union of Farmers)