Agro-Industrial Parks: proposal for an integrated AHP-TOPSIS approach for guiding territorial tools settlements in Africa

It is known that agriculture constitutes a pillar of the African economy. However, its supply chain inefficiency does not allow it to exploit its potential and respond to the growing food needs of the population. Furthermore, even if Africa has enormous possibilities for arable land, agricultural productivity remains low because small production units support it. A practical tool to face these problems is Agro-Industrial Park (AIP), which presents numerous advantages, allowing enterprises to share and exploit raw materials, utilities, information resources, transport, etc. When implementing AIP, one of the most crucial steps is the correct localization considering countries' features and local requirements. Although the facility location problem has been widely discussed in the literature, few studies investigate how to support decision-makers in the optimal location of AIPs in Africa. The present paper describes a multi-criteria decision-making model (MCDM), defining all the criteria to support the AIP location. The criteria have been selected through a literature review and subsequently validated by a board of agro-industry experts from the United Nations Industrial Development Organization. The proposed framework integrates the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) and the Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS). The model allows evaluating the most suitable countries for implementing AIP projects in Africa, incentivizing investments, and reducing risks. As a final result, a ranking of African countries in which it is most reasonable to implement AIP projects is returned based on the selected criteria. The results suggest that, in general, the macro-region of North Africa presents more favorable conditions for such projects. More in detail, both South Africa and Mauritius present several advantages in implementing AIP projects.