Common and Elective Courses

On completion of this course you will be able to ...

• Explain the main concepts in the field of supply chain management
• Critically assess the literature on supply chain management and make applications to real-life chains in the African context
• Critically evaluate the impact of global value chains on food value chains in Africa
• Evaluate information, inventory and logistics management and coordination in supply chains to identify areas of improvement and opportunity
• Identify uncertainties and risk in supply chains and recommend strategies that may be used to mitigate risks that make supply chains fragile
• Evaluate improvement options in supply chains regarding chain strategy, chain design, power relations and trust, and chain collaboration
• Understand financial concepts pertaining to supply chains and apply financing instruments commonly used to finance activities in the agricultural and food supply chains
• Explain and be able to debate the main developments and issues in national, regional and international chains
• Demonstrate familiarity with digital platforms and technologies to remain competitive in the 21st century
• Apply a wide range of practical and analytical skills to undertake industry and value chain analysis to identify chain weaknesses, strengths, opportunities, and threats for improved competitiveness and performance

In this course you will ...

The purpose of this course is to provide learners with a deeper understanding of the agricultural marketing systems, processes and price formation mechanisms. After completing this course, the students should be able to:

• Apply economic theory to address problems of agricultural marketing.
  
• Design strategies for effective market performance.
  
• Use marketing concepts for analysing market structure and performance in agriculture and formulate effective agricultural marketing policies.
  
• Apply theoretical models of imperfect market structures to inform public policy.
  
• Estimate demand and supply functions of various agricultural products.
  
• Understand price discovery mechanisms under different market structures.
  
• Critically analyze value chains of different agricultural products.
  
• Understand the role of cooperatives and emerging organizations such as supermarkets in the marketing of agricultural products, and their implications to the livelihoods of value chain actors involved.
  

The course seeks to provide a practical overview on Agricultural Investment Planning at strategic level, as well as planning and management of Agricultural projects. Although projects are virtually in every sector of the economy, it is expected that there will be a bias on agricultural projects. The concepts and skills taught to the students will however be applicable to any project in any sector.

Specifically, the course will aim to:

• Expose students to important concepts and skills critical to the Investment planning process and management of Agricultural projects
• Guide students on how to plan, evaluate and manage investment plans and projects.
• Understand scope management, the project life cycle, project risks, etc
• Expose students on how to develop and effectively apply various concepts e.g. CPM and PERT in project management.
• Expose and enhance application of logical framework in project planning
• Understand the importance of quality management in project management

This course reviews the origins and evolution of natural and environmental resource economics. It describes and studies the application of economic principles and analytical methods for sustainable development of natural resources. Sources of inefficiency and causes of environmental degradation are examined. An introduction to the concepts and methods underlying the design and implementation of environmental policies are provided. Economic valuation of natural and environmental resources is introduced.

Natural resources (e.g. land, water, soil and air) provide a fundamental input to production in the sense that it may be physically impossible to produce welfare enhancing output, without using natural resources as inputs. In this course, an attempt is made to connect sustainable environment and natural resources management with sustainable welfare. The course aims at preparing students for the more technically advanced courses in environmental and natural resources economics. To make this course accessible to a wide variety of students, the presentation is overall non-technical.

At the end of the this module, learners should be able to: 

• Explain the foundational concepts of food security and nutrition (FSN) and the policy process
• Articulate the influence on human wellbeing and development of global, regional and national level complexities of the topic
• Explain the interrelated causes of food insecurity and malnutrition (production, markets and socio-economic, health and sanitation context and institutional environment)
• Understand the role of food systems and their transformation on food security and nutrition.
• Describe how coping strategies and response to risk and shocks and apply this to the identification of programme options in various contexts 
• Be able to identify the possible impact of the macro economy on household dynamics (including livelihoods, purchasing behaviour and nutrition)
• Apply practical tools for programme and policy analysis and targeting
• Offer possible programme and policy options and identification of the tools to evaluate their effectiveness in terms of achieving comprehensive and pro-poor growth.

The course aims to:

• Acquaint the learners with the fundamental concepts underlying international trade.
• Give the learners an appreciation of the factors that make international trade to be an important policy agenda;
• Provide the learners with a firm foundation to develop basic analytical skills for diagnosing, describing and analyzing agricultural trade policy problems;
• Provide the learners with an appreciation of why nations should constantly monitor changes in the international market environment;
• Understand the role of economic integration. Familiarize the learners with the motives, types and institutional framework of regional integration schemes, and with international commodity agreements; and
• Expose the learners to global trade and agricultural policies of main institutions influencing agricultural trade involving developing countries.

Objectives

At the end of the course you should be able to:

• Understand key concepts of dynamic models
• Build, simulate and optimise a dynamic model
• Use model results in designing policies for improving the management of natural resources in Africa

Objectives