Jeremy Riro
Contributor, THE AFRICA BAZAAR magazine
May 2018
Our current model of agriculture is definitely not working; otherwise, we would not be having a growing number of people facing severe food insecurity each day. We must look for an alternative agribusiness model that works for our part of the world.
That we are facing severe food insecurity in the African continent is not a matter of intellectual guesswork, but rather a solid statement of fact.
According to statistics from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, as of 2015, 26 percent of the African population above the age of 15 years suffered from severe food shortage. That is about 153 million mouths that Africa is not able to feed at any given day.
FAO further reported that about 20 percent of the people living in sub-Saharan Africa were undernourished in 2016.
The big question then is; why do we still import more than USD 35 billion worth of food into the continent annually; yet we have more than 60 percent of the uncultivated arable land in the world? Mark you the annual food import bill for Africa is estimated to rise to more than USD 110 billion by 2025 if no corrective measures are taken to reverse the trend.
Erosion of food sovereignty
When we are told that Africa is the food basket of the world; and then we run to grow lentils, mushrooms, strawberries and such other crops for the export market when our people are dying of starvation in Turkana, then you know we have a major issue. Charity should always start at home!
Food traceability is becoming a more complex issue in a more globalized agribusiness ecosystem.
Walking through the grocery sections in Nairobi supermarkets, you will find imported fresh produce ranging from tomatoes, onions and other assorted fruits and vegetables. Despite the high prices of these imported fresh produce, the buyers have no clue whatsoever about how the food was grown, the chemicals used in its production and the nutritional value they derive from consuming it.
We no longer have control of what we eat and food sovereignty is taking a back seat across the world. We have delegated our freedom to choose what we eat to a few individuals in multinationals; who don’t care how much harmful chemicals we consume in as much they increase their bottom lines.
In the past few decades, proponents of the Green Revolution have propagated their monoculture large scale farming systems across the world so effectively and very fast. Unfortunately, even the African continent with its food insecurity challenges has been trapped into pursuing large scale farming of specific crops that are deemed to earn high market prices; while shunning what used to be our traditional staple foods.
I have no problem with the green revolution movement; but we [Africans] also need to ask ourselves hard questions and find the right answers to feed Africa and the world as a whole.
When we are told that Africa is the food basket of the world; and then we run to grow lentils, mushrooms, strawberries and such other crops for the export market when our people are dying of starvation in Turkana, then you know we are brainwashed. Charity should always start at home!
The industrial revolution had its significant contribution into human civilization by introducing mechanization, which increased efficiency in agriculture, and increased farm yields through scientific methods of farming and production of hybrid seeds.
However, with it also came monoculture which necessitated the use of harmful chemicals and synthetic fertilizers in order to sustain high yields over the years on the same piece of land.
This has led to soil degradation, which is a threat to our ability to produce enough food to feed our future generations. In addition, lifestyle diseases are becoming rampant in our society as a result of consuming farm chemicals used in mass production of food in large plantations across the world.
Ultimately, this has led to reduced productivity among citizens, increasing healthcare costs for households as well as increasing dependency from sick relatives and friends.
What if we changed our agribusiness model?
Smallholder farmers, not the large plantations, produce 80 percent of the food we consume, hence they carry the solution to our food insecurity problem.
Our current model of agriculture is definitely not working; otherwise, we would not be having a growing number of people facing severe food insecurity each day. We must look for an alternative agribusiness model that works for our part of the world.
Smallholder farmers, not the large plantations; produce 80 percent of the food we consume, hence they carry the solution to our food insecurity problem.
What if we embraced conservation agriculture at the smallholder farmer level in order to increase farm productivity and converse our farmlands for future generations? What if we funded the 33 million smallholder farmers across Africa to produce traceable, healthy and nutritious food to feed the 1.2 billion mouths in Africa today?
What if we dared to think different and channel the USD 35 billion used in food import to building the production capacity of our local smallholder to feed the 153 million starving Africans?
As we ponder answers and try to find solutions to these questions, let’s begin to improve food security for Africans by investing in smallholder farmers on the continent.
About the author:
Jeremy Riro is a strategy consultant, financial analyst, and managing partner at Fie Consult, a Nairobi-based consulting firm for SME. He’s also a 2018 Mandela Washington Fellow, winner of the 2016 World Bank #Blog4Dev and the 2016 United Nations Women Young Innovators in Agriculture.
*This is an OP-ED article. The opinion expressed in this post is that of the author.
© 2018 THEAFRICABAZAAR magazine, a publication of Imek Media, LLC. All rights reserved.
