Small-scale agriculture should be seen as a business

Speaking in Cape Town, Dr. Kanayo Nwanze, president of the International Fund for Agriculture Development (IFAD), said impoverished rural people want opportunities to enter into economic activity. “What is gratifying for me is that a few years ago you would not hear people talking smallholder agriculture as a business. At the World Economic Forum on [...]

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African countries need to shift to more drought-resistant crops

A recent report by the climate change Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) research group says global warming will cause famine in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. CCAFS researchers focused their observations on the tropics and identified the regions with chronically-malnourished populations who are highly dependent on local food supplies. As many African areas are expected [...]

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UN report: Higher food prices here to stay

According to report from the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), higher food prices and volatile commodity markets are here to stay. The report said a good harvest in the coming months “may keep prices below the extreme levels seen earlier this year.” However, this is [...]

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Decline in competitiveness in many sub-Saharan states

As growth in some sub-Saharan countries hits 6% there is still no large-scale African middle class emerging, while China and Brazil reap benefits of resource imports. Declining competitiveness in parts of Africa is beginning to concern economists. Speaking on Summit TV, Frontier Advisory analyst Martyn Davies believes that there is a continuing decline in competitiveness [...]

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Food security: Farming the cities; feeding an urban future

As people move from rural to urban settings in search of economic opportunities, urban agriculture is becoming an important provider of both food and employment, according to researchers with the Worldwatch Institute. The rate of urban migration is particularly high in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, where inadequate urban infrastructure struggles to keep up with [...]

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G20 attacked on food crisis plan

The US, Brazil and China have joined forces to water down the G20’s first-ever communiqué on agriculture, defeating proposals to reduce the use of biofuels and export bans, which have contributed to close to record food commodities prices. The two-day meeting (22-23 June) came after France made food security and commodities regulation a centrepiece of [...]

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Is biotechnology the answer to Africa’s food security?

Feeding Africa is a significant challenge as there are currently nearly one billion food insecure people in the world, says Willem Engelbrecht, South Africa manager of DuPont business Pioneer Hi-Bred. However, Africa’s favourable climatic conditions and natural agricultural resources are sufficient to address these challenges, if utilised correctly. Biotechnology is a viable solution to increasing [...]

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The commodification of water and land in Mali

For the inhabitants of the Dogon plateau at Bandiagara in Mali, water is both a source of life and a public good. Now the privatisation of water threatens to exclude citizens from managing their most precious resource. Ecological representation of water as a common good explains why the creation of the ‘water business’ and the [...]

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Gates Foundation commits $1.7 billion for farming in Africa

The world’s largest charitable foundation announced five years ago it would spend millions of dollars to fight poverty and hunger in Africa, largely by investing in agriculture. To date, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has committed $1.7 billion, but its leaders say it could take 20 years to see the results of that work. [...]

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With new investments, Israel again is looking to Africa

Israel’s development aid to Africa shrunk to its current low levels following the 1973 Yom Kippur War, when most African states severed ties with Israel. That ended a period in which Israel sent some 5 000 experts in agriculture and other fields to countries throughout the developing world. However, there are many Israeli companies in [...]

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